If I were asked under what sky the human mind has most fully developed some of its choicest gifts, has most deeply pondered on the greatest problems of life, and has found solutions, I should point to India. Max Mueller (German scholar)

We end today a period of ill fortune and India discovers herself again. The achievement we celebrate today is but a step, an opening of opportunity, to the greater triumphs and achievements that await us. Are we brave enough and wise enough to grasp this opportunity and accept the challenge of the future? Jawaharlal Nehru

Long years ago we made a tryst with destiny, and now the time comes when we shall redeem our pledge,...At the stroke of the midnight hour, when the world sleeps, India will awake to life and freedom. Jawaharlal Nehru

We owe a lot to the Indians, who taught us how to count, without which no worthwhile scientific discovery could have been made. -Albert Einstein

When a man is in doubt what to do, he goes wherever he happens to be first called. Bankim Chandra Chattopadhyay

At the dawn of history India started on her unending quest, and trackless centuries are filled with her striving and the grandeur of her success and her failures. Through good and ill fortune alike she has never lost sight of that quest or forgotten the ideals which gave her strength. Jawaharlal Nehru

We are Indians, firstly and lastly. B.R. Ambedkar