It is with a deep spirit of gratitude and veneration that we commemorate all our national heroes and patriots who engaged themselves in the struggle for the liberation of our beloved motherland from the Colonial powers as we complete 74 years of our nation’s independence. Among these national heroes we commemorate with special gratitude those who laid down their lives in this cause, those who led the independence struggle in the period preceding 1948 and all the truly patriotic people of this nation who raise their voices even today for the cause of true freedom.
We need to consider the political and social freedoms which were won through the commitment of these heroes, as a gift of immense value to our beloved motherland. It is the responsibility of all of us, then, to protect this freedom and strengthen it further. Yet one has to sadly affirm that after obtaining independence, due to a growing spirit of subservience to different ideologies over the years, the craving for power by our political leaders and the increasing spirit of greed for wealth, our beloved homeland has slid into an unredeemable precipice of moral, spiritual, economic and social degradation.
One has to affirm that in the 74 years of our post-independence era, as a nation, we have begun to gradually lose our hard won freedom. Due to the short sighted and unintelligent actions of our political leaders, past and present, leading to the spread of a spirit of deep division and mistrust among the different ethnic and religious groups; galloping corruption prevalent among those whom we have elected as our leaders and the continuous manipulation of the rule of law by them, to suit their own interests, the people in this country have begun to increasingly feel that, for them, independence turns out to be a meaningless word.
In these present times more and more people in our country are suffering from poverty and are becoming victims of a new sort of slavery resulting from the short sighted decisions of our political leaders. Thus there emerges a question in our minds as to what happened to our hard gained independence. If we really love our motherland, it is indeed necessary to do an examination of conscience about what has happened to us. Independence is not an experience which mn be obtained by mere celebrations, speeches or parades and march pasts.
At a moment like this, what all those who truly love our homeland should do is to engage in a profound examination of conscience and to seek a total transformation of our society seeking to extricate our country from the effects of those decisions that led It on to this downward slide. Committing ourselves to that is the best way to commemorate our independence.
It is not far from the truth when we state that the best way to strengthen the freedom gained with such sacrifices, is to go for a radical change in our national options. Vail of us commit ourselves to work for that transformation, it would be the best and the most effective service we could render our motherland.
May our Motherland be blessed!
