Where the Mind is Without Fear

-Rabindranath Tagore

(This poem was published in 1910 and it appears in the English Version of Geetanjali.)

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 lead forward by thee into ever-widening thought and action–

Into that heaven of freedom, my Father, let my country awake.

Tagore felt sorry that his fellow countrymen were not good enough to enjoy the freedom, even if they would get that. They were afraid of the British suppression. They did not have the sense of self-dignity. Most were ignorant, lazy and superstitious. The class and caste system kept the people away from each other. So, the poet wanted to express his feelings and thoughts by praying to the Almighty (God) for the good of his countrymen. He wanted people to come out from the darkness of all evils. His vision was to see his country as a ‘heaven of freedom’ where people are knowledgeable, truthful, rational, broadminded, fearless and hardworking.

Are we free today?

Let us Know your thoughts.