Free mind

Where the mind is without fear and the head is held high
Where knowledge is free
Where the world has not been broken up into fragments
By narrow domestic walls
Where words come out from the depth of truth
Where tireless striving stretches its arms towards perfection
Where the clear stream of reason has not lost its way
Into the dreary desert sand of dead habit
Where the mind is led forward by thee
Into ever-widening thought and action
Into that heaven of freedom, my Father, let my country awake.

We all know this is a free verse written by our freedom fighter who fought with the power of words. 

I read this poem after our triumph celebration of the 75th Independence Day of India. 

I was left alone with heaps of questions......But to begin with - have we actually gotten freedom?

I mean each moment of the day even small children live within the prison of their feared minds.

What will me teacher say if I didn't finish this......What do my friends think about me??

A few things we cannot avoid, 

But I feel we all have this induced fear of what the society thinks of our actions......weather it affects them or not...it is something they somehow must comment on. Is this atmosphere freedom?

The awareness about the need of Knowledge, literacy has increased greatly. I think we are trying to live by the thirukural and a quote by Benjaman Franklin - An investment in knowledge pays the best interest.

From the world being broken by narrow domestic walls, we have come to each person being torn apart admist the many decisions we have to take. From transforming into an adult to being a responsible citizen of the country, we have an entire world for us to choose from. '' Change the world to the place you desire to live in '' - that would be quite a task. I feel people have changed a lot, compromised a lot in order to live better.  We all study with the aid of the nation's resources with the reason of inadequate job opportunities we move out. Is this changing ourselves? - It is quite a one-sided perspective of interpreting the situation, but I felt it must be put across. 

Wouldn't it be quite a transformation if we had ever-widening thought and action? Now-a-days seems like narrow minds and narrow actions are the trend. It's literally spoiling the society greatly. Every action done outside your circle of acceptance is wrong?

From this poem I learnt that heaven is no separate place far from our reach. We are to create that heaven for it is something that comes from within. 

Believing that these thoughts are absurd I dozed off just like any other person. It's common sense to understand these things would be impossible. But I see a dim light down the path...If we could fight for our freedom from British would it be hard to change the people we have grown up with??

Do share your comments on this post! Thank you very much for reading it!

- Bharathi Senthilkumar