'Yes man' that have surrounded Nehruvian and Indira Gandhi style of governance who  lead in the list of inefficient and anti-people  governance,  have been the biggest threat to nation. The lack of leadership that has blighted India not just on political scene but in all the  spheres of life where 'greatness is imposed or inherited' is the reason why we continued to have begging bowl in front of developed nations and the world bank until 2014. This CD was gifted to me by my childhood friend Dhirendra Chaturvedi, an officer in Madhya Pradesh government, the comments are mine, I take to blame and credit if any.

Father de Souza, General D'Souza, ladies and gentlemen, I am here under false pretenses.

I must be the only 1 here who has never been into a college.

I am most appreciative of his kind words.

My only regret is that my wife wasn't here to hear them.

She would have treated me with greater respect.

And when I say I'm uneducated, I really mean it.

I must be the only member of my family who isn't a graduate.

I managed to do my inter-science, I got a third division mushkil se.

Anyway it's nice being in this hall with all the academics and all the educated people.

of inaugurating your Silver Jubilee series on leadership.

I don't know what 1 does for inauguration, but may I say that

For a long time, I've been watching the scene in India very carefully.

Whenever I go, whenever I pick up a newspaper, I find there are shortages.

There's a shortage of fuel, there's a shortage of food, there is a shortage of foreign exchange, there is shortage of housing, shortage of schools, colleges, everywhere.

And everybody talks about these shortages.

But the 1 shortage Which is responsible for all these shortages is generally glossed over which is the shortage of leadership

Father Don't misunderstand me and gentlemen of the press, please don't misquote me, which you are always capable of doing and which you continue doing.

When I talk of shortage of leadership, I do not mean just political leadership.

I mean leadership in every walk of life Whether it's political administrative in educational institutions in our sports organizations, in our industry,

amongst labour, amongst the law and order contingents, there is a shortage of leadership.

I do not know whether leaders are born or leaders are made.

There is a school of thought which says leaders are born.

Father We have a population of 780 million people and we procreate at

And yet there is a shortage of leadership.

So if those of you who think that leaders are born and who contribute to that theory may I suggest you throw away all planned parenthood and really let yourselves go.

If leaders are not born can leaders be made?

that give me a man with reasonable common sense and decency you can make a leader out of him.

The cardinal Attribute for leadership is professional knowledge and professional competence.

Now you will agree with me that you cannot be born with professional knowledge even if you are the child of a minister, the son of a member of parliament or the progeny of a field marshal.

Professional knowledge has to be acquired the hard way.

Professors, engineers, architects, lawyers, solicitors, doctors, they all study their professions continuously.

They all contribute to magazines, to news prints, to all sorts of things.

But we in India, as soon as we reach positions of power, whether it

is ministerial, secretarial, armed forces or anywhere else, we think we are the repository of all knowledge.

Professional knowledge has to be acquired the hard way and without professional knowledge you can never have professional competence and if you haven't got professional competence you cannot be a leader.

those civilian gentlemen who have been charged with the security of this country, whether they have ever read a book on the military profession.

I wonder if they know the difference between a gun or a howitzer.

I'd left being the army chieftain and said and I will talk to you in his own language zara batao ye hovitzer kya cheez hoti hai and I said what are you talking about hovitzer

Then I discovered that he meant howitzer.

Why don't you ask the army chief and others?

I wonder if they can distinguish a mortar from a mortar.

Ladies and gentlemen, professional knowledge is a sine

to have professional competence if you are expected to lead anything.

are in the army, Whether you are in the teaching profession, whether you are

you have professional competence and professional knowledge, you cannot be a leader.

And having taken that decision, accepting full responsibility for it.

who have suffered at the hands of superiors who cannot take a decision know what it's like.

An act of omission is much worse than an act of commission.

An act of commission can be put right even if

the decision is wrong by colleagues, by subordinates, by somebody, but an act of omission cannot be put right.

Because he lacks professional knowledge and competence.

will tell you that when I was the army chief I'd go around ask my generals what are you doing about this and he said sir I've been thinking I've been considering and then I produced for myself a manic shoyism and father will you forgive my language.

I used to say if you must be a bloody fool, be 1 quickly.

Take a decision and then accept full responsibility for it.

Do you know how much money is lost in the country because somebody won't take a decision.

Costs escalate, papers lie in somebody's place for days, for months, for years and when they finally take a decision, the cost of a project, the cost of something has gone up tenfold.

So that's the second requisite for leadership.

The ability to make up one's mind, take a decision and then stand by it.

What comes next absolute justice and impartiality those of us who have dealt with masses of men and I have dealt with over a million men in my time,

know the value of this absolute justice and impartiality.

No man likes being punished and yet men will accept punishment if they know

that everybody who commits that sort of a crime gets the same sort of punishment.

They may not like you but they will respect you.

yet people will accept supersession if they know that it's been done fairly and they've been superseded by somebody who is better than them.

But not because he happens to be a minister's son

Souza or the fieldmaster's wife's current boyfriend.

They may not like it, but they will do it.

Now ladies and gentlemen, this is very very important in our country.

We have fathers, mothers, uncles, aunts, nephews, nieces, their fathers, mothers, etc.

We have pressures from them, we have pressures from members of Parliament, we have pressures from all sorts of people

and we lack the courage to withstand that pressure.

This is very important for us in India and that takes me to the next attribute moral and physical courage.

I do not know which is more important moral courage or physical courage.

When I am talking to a lot of soldiers I would lay emphasis on physical courage

am only talking to a handful of soldiers and mostly civilians, I will lay emphasis on moral courage.

Moral courage is the ability to distinguish

And having distinguished that you must have the courage to stand up and say your piece.

Irrespective of what your superior thinks irrespective of your colleagues, irrespective of your subordinates.

But he will never, never become a leader.

and his subordinates have no respect for them.

Now since you wanted to know some examples of moral courage from my past, I will give you a little story.

when General Yahya Khan put all the pressure on East Pakistan as it was then

I remember the date very well 28th of April.

I had a very strong Prime Minister and Mrs.

Gandhi who ranted and raved at me, said what are you doing about it?

The chief minister of Bengal has just sent me a telegram.

The chief minister of Tripura has done this.

that there are more Bengalis there than their own population.

And I said nothing, nothing to do with me.

And she said I want you to go in and take action.

And I said do you know what that means Prime Minister?

I said it means war and she said I don't mind if there's war.

So I said may I please quote from the Bible the first book, the first chapter, the first verse, God said let there be light and there was light and you say let there be war, there be war.

The monsoon will break very shortly and the whole of East Pakistan will be a swamp.

The Air Force will not be able to operate.

April is a month when we gather, glean the

And I said, I will require every railway wagon, I will require every train, I will require all the road space to move my troops and you will not be able to move your harvest and then if there is a famine don't blame me and I said the passes in the Himalayas start opening now the snow melts and then if the Chinese give us an ultimatum I will have to fight on 2 fronts.

Then the external affairs minister, a Khalsa, Sardar Swaran Singh said, do you think China will give ultimatum?

And I said, you are the foreign minister you tell me

and then my own minister Jagjivan Ram who couldn't call me Sam, he

I said you ka manne ki baat hai, I am telling you what the facts are.

And I said, if you want me to do this, Prime Minister, I guarantee you

Now, Prime Minister, give me your orders.

And she turned around and said, the cabinet will meet at 04:00 This happened at 1030 in the morning so as The cabinet ministers walked out I being the junior most man there Was the last to go she said Chief will you stay behind?

So I shut the door and I said Prime Minister before you speak Do you wish me to send in my resignation on grounds of health mental or physical?

It's my job to tell you if your father in

country would not have been disgraced, the army would not have been beaten.

But the army chief did not have moral courage of turning around and telling him he wasn't ready.

So, she said, all right, you know what I want?

And I must be allowed to do it my own way.

And she said, all right, you know what I want.

So ladies and gentlemen, there is a very thin line between becoming a field marshal and being dismissed.

I just gave you an illustration of moral courage.

Of course I didn't worry very much because my wife had money if I'd gone.

So much for moral courage, now I come to physical courage.

Fear is a natural phenomenon like hunger and sex.

Anyone who says he is not frightened is a liar, except perhaps the Gurkha.

It is 1 thing to be frightened and quite another to show fear.

It's when your knees are knocking and your teeth are chattering and you're about to make your own geography.

If once you show fear in front of men that you may be commanding, it doesn't matter whether they are soldiers, they are clerks, they are labor, they are students, once you show fear you should quit.

Now again General Jaisura said I must give some examples from my own life.

I was commanding a Sikh company, big tough chaps, very fond of them.

See all aksharma1947 transcripts on Youtube

Leadership Lecture Sam Manekshaw