Indira Gandhi

“Have a bias toward action - let's see something happen now. You can break that big plan into small steps and take the first step right away.”

“The collective judgment of the electorate must be respected.”

“There is not love where there is no will.”

“A nation' s strength ultimately consists in what it can do on its own, and not in what it can borrow from others.”

“Happiness is a state of mind, you know. I don't think you are permanently happy. One is happy about certain things and not so happy about others.”

“We do not wish to impoverish the environment any further, and yet we cannot for a moment forget the grim poverty of large numbers of people. Are not poverty and need the greatest polluters?”

“You cannot shake hands with a clenched fist.”

“I am not a person to be pressured - by anybody or any nation.”

“This is why we feel that democracy's important: because democracy allows you to have small explosions and therefore avoid the bigger explosions.”

“The environmental problems of developing countries are not the side effects of excessive industrialisation but reflect the inadequacy of development.”

“Forgiveness is a virtue of the brave.”

“There are grave misgivings that the discussion on ecology may be designed to distract attention from the problems of war and poverty.”

“There exists no politician in India daring enough to attempt to explain to the masses that cows can be eaten.”

“I do not like carving the world into segments; we are one world.”

“The power to question is the basis of all human progress.”

“I was happy to be with my parents. I didn't see very much of them, so I was very happy when my father was there and out of jail.”

“All my games were political games; I was, like Joan of Arc, perpetually being burned at the stake.”

“If I die a violent death, as some fear and a few are plotting, I know that the violence will be in the thought and the action of the assassins, not in my dying.”

“I've never turned to anybody for advice and counsel. Even when I was a very small child, I had to stand on my feet because of the circumstances of those times, and somehow, the circumstances have remained more or less the same. I have to take my own decisions.”

“My son had nothing to do with policy or decision making, nor did I discuss the elections or any other matter with him.”