Punjabi People

"If you stand under a mountain and look up, you will get a bad pain in the neck. If you look at the ground and take one step, and then another step, then you come to a little bump. You think of how to climb over it; then you find a gap and you jump over it and you go on like that, one step at a time, and suddenly, you find yourself standing on top of the mountain."

"Test cricket is for batsmen, not bowlers. Bowlers are like slaves," Kapil Dev."

"If I can do something for the game and the young cricketers through the ICL, I will not budge"

"...his mother was very old, and his father was no longer alive -- hence there cannot be another Kapil Dev!"

"It appeared as if the whole nation stood up to greet me in Ahmedabad on my taking the 432nd wicket. The country was proud and that made me really happy...This was the first time in my life I realized what it is to be the number 1 in the world. It is a heady feeling almost out of the world."

"I don’t tell myself I am a hero. People do look up to performers and think of them as heroes...Hero worship in India is too big. It is both right and wrong. It is fair to respect people who have done things that others haven’t but it is not right to traet them as gods."

"Look, if you take the best batting team in the world, they too will have their weaknesses -- otherwise, wouldn't they win all the time? You mention any team to me, and I will pick out for you a dozen weaknesses. But that is not the point -- these things, like fielding, running between wickets, all these are technical things, they can be learnt and practised."

"What is required is self-belief, most importantly. And secondly, you should be ready to listen, to be strong to acknowledge what your weakness is, and learn, improve... If you have that, then all this that you are talking about, fielding, running between wickets, they are all minor things..."

"...the joy of winning the World Cup cannot be compared with any amount of money"

"Well, the Caribbeans were far superior on paper but we could utilize the English conditions better during the tournament. Mind you, we had won against bigger opponents, matches after matches. I think nobody can deny that. How could then it be termed as a fluke?"

"When we returned [to] India, we realised how the countrymen had celebrated the win! Everybody was over the moon. Some of them said that the August 15, 1947 came back."

"We had won many trophies before and after that like the team under MSD are winning now. But the joy of that day is something different. May be because it was the first time we had won the coveted World Cup. Each year for these 30 years, I start receiving phone calls and texts from the night of June 24 the way I receive the same for my birthday!"

"...that if you want to do something, achieve something, you can't be thinking all the time of what you don't have... I don't have an opening batsman, I don't have a fast bowler, I don't have an all-rounder... You think like this and you are telling yourself you can't win. You have to see what you have, and then plan how to use it the best way you can, that is how to win games. Not this business of 'we don't have an all-rounder so we are not a balanced team!"

"Tournaments like the World Cup, they are a bit like that -- you can't start out by thinking of how you will play the final at Lord's. You look at your first opponent and you think how to defeat him, then you think of your next opponent. It doesn't matter who you think you might meet in the final, you should only think of your next match. That is the only way to win a tournament, that is what we did in 1983, we played one match at a time..."

"India didn’t play particularly well, but if you ask me I would say my best memory is we beat eventual winners Pakistan in a league match. It’s not a positive memory for me, but to say we beat the team which held the trophy makes me feel better."

"The uniforms are my other memory. In the beginning, they looked odd. In the cricket world, we were used to playing in whites. Back then, the world was changing, television was changing and you needed people to see more colour. So, I think they did a great thing.""

"Back then, people were calling it pyjama cricket, but I think if you look back, you have to change yourself with the time and I think the administrators did the right thing. Now you look at Cricket World Cup as colourful and that’s because of 1992. It represents national pride and everybody has their own colours to identify themselves with and be proud,” said Kapil, for whom the 1992 edition was the last World Cup."

"An all-round cricketer of charismatic brilliance."

"The BCCI acknowledges Mr. Kapil Dev's immense contribution to Indian cricket and looks forward to a fruitful association with him in the years to come."

"Our American coach, Dr. [Arthur W] Howard, had accompanied the Indian team [to Cardiff] ….Because of Dr. Howard's motivation and advice, I won heat after heat and effortlessly reached the finals."

"I was moved to tears by the thought that from being nobody the night before, I had become somebody."

"The track, to me, was like an open book, in which I could read the meaning and purpose of life. I revered it like I would the sanctum sanctorum in a temple, where the deity resided and before whom I would humbly prostrate myself as a devotee. To keep myself steadfast to my goal, I renounced all pleasures and distractions, to keep myself fit and healthy, and dedicated my life to the ground where I could practice and run. Running had thus become my God, my religion and my beloved,"

"I would not stop till I had filled up a bucket with my sweat. I would push myself so much that in the end I would collapse and I would have to be admitted to hospital, I would pray to God to save me, promise that I would be more careful in future. And then I would do it all over again."

"My most enduring memory of that year is not the birth of India and Pakistan. I could not even comprehend what was happening. As a teenager from a backward village in Pakistan, I had never seen a cycle, car or train. I was completely bewildered at the turn of events. All that mattered was how to get my next meal, usually a roti and an onion."

"Our entire village of Gobindpur Kot had been massacred, as the elders had taken a collective decision not to convert to Islam as they had been asked to. Among those killed were my parents and two of my sisters. My elder brother survived; a sepoy in the British army, he was posted at Multan. Two of my other sisters were married and lived elsewhere."

"You can achieve anything in life. It just depends on how desperate you are to achieve it."

"Each of these moments brings back bitter sweet memories as they represent the different stages of my life, a life that has been kept afloat by my intense determination to triumph in my chosen vocation"

"Sprinting from one shady patch to another to escape the blistering heat of the sun on my journey to school Felling the massacre on that fearsome night when most of my family was slaughtered racing trains for fun outrunning the police when I was caught stealing in Shahdra leaving every one behind in my first race as an army jawan so that I could get an extra glass of milk surging past my competitors in Tokyo when I was declared Asia’s best athlete Running in Pakistan and being hailed as "The Flying Sikh"."

"When I reflect upon my life, I can clearly see how my passion for running has dominated my life. The images that flash through my mind are those running....running…running…"

"Discipline, hard work, will power....My experience made me so hard that I wasn't even scared of death." But one story reflects his desire clearest."

"He emphasized that I must maintain my speed for the first 300 metres, and then give it my all in the last 100 metres. He said that if I ran the first 300 metres at full speed, Spence would do the same, although that was not his running strategy."

"In my career I met so many movie stars, but starting a life together and building a home goes beyond all other relationships," he explains. "I found in her a human being and a woman who would take care of my family. I found in my wife both compassion and understanding."

"I never knew there was a romance. The only thing I knew was that she came into my life. I was not concerned about her past. I know these questions arise. But I am concerned about the person who comes in my life; what matters from that day on is how true the person is to me. The past is nothing to me."

"My concept of secularism is to be a good human being who respects all religions."

"One of my first tasks is to instill discipline into the organisation. We do not need slogan shouting. Too many 'leaders' do nothing but sit on podiums or get themselves photographed with other leaders. This must stop. The Youth Congress leaders must go back to the roots and serve the people. I want to bring back value-based politics to the youth wing."

"Rejuvenate the Youth Congress. Make it more effective. People-oriented. I will supervise how the Youth Congress is performing and suggest ways and means to improve the way it works. It has to have a positive, dynamic image."

"I have been a lifelong Congressman because I believe in the party's philosophy."

"It dates back to a day in 1987 when Punjab was burning. I read about a spastic girl and her parents being killed in Amritsar. It disturbed me and I decided to march to Amritsar from Mumbai on foot. It was part of Gandhian philosophy that if your people are doing wrong you punish yourself. Gandhiji would fast; likewise, I decided to walk and inflict some pain on myself. It was a way of sharing the pain."

"If there is no friendship with one's neighbours, no one can progress. Look at Canada and the USA -- both countries help each other."

"His life reads like a film script; his commitment to social issues superseded his loyalty to the Congress"

"From impoverished Partition refugee to popular film star to Member of Parliament to a Minister in the Union Cabinet — the story of Sunil Dutt's life reads like a film script."

"A very special human being...He had friends and admirers not just in India but also across the world who will now miss him."

"After extended-and successful-battles against w:cancer:cancer, drugs and anti-terrorism laws, all of which touched his family, Sunil Dutt has opened on another front. This time the fight is also personal. The National Census for 2001 ignores the disabled on grounds that such a surveyis beyond the scope and capacity of its operations. But this man in a wheel-chair, refuses to let the matter lie. Sunil Dutt, MP, Mumbai northwest, partially paralyzed by a spinal disorder, is spearheading the movement against the ongoing census.In a letter to Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee, Dutt has demanded that the census should also take into account the disabled of the country. “Are they not people?”, he asks as he tries to rise to his feet."

"His passing away is not only a great loss to the sports fraternity but that to the nation as avery popular man of art and culture and a great national political leader."

"It was his support and encouragement that had helped me to go abroad for training. He was great supporter of sports in general and his passing away is a big loss."

"Every shooter winning a medal at the CommonWealth event received a personal fax from Mr. Sunil Dutt, Iy made us feel special."

"He was a man who was prepared to discuss topics for the improvement of sports in the country."

"He was true soldier without a gun. Although life had played many tricks with him, he always overcame them."

"Mr Dutt was a man who worked for world peace."

"I have heard about Christ, but I am very happy that I am walking with Christ [Sunil Dutt]."