The role of people’s representatives is most important in a democracy, President Ram Nath Kovind said today.

Addressing members of Gujarat Legislative Assembly in Gandhinagar, he said members of the Legislative Assembly are representatives of the people of their area and state.

”But the more important thing is that the people consider them to be the creators of their destiny. The hopes and aspirations of the people are associated with them,” he said, adding that efforts to fulfil those aspirations of the people should be paramount for all of them.

Pointing to the fact that he was addressing the members of the state Assembly when India is celebrating ”Azadi ka Amrit Mahotsav”, the President said that there is no better place than Gujarat to celebrate freedom and its ”Amrit Mahotsav”.

The people of the Gujarat region were pioneers in envisioning an independent India. In the last decades of the 19th century, personalities like Dadabhai Naoroji and Feroz Shah Mehta raised their voices for the rights of Indians. That struggle was continuously strengthened by the people of Gujarat and eventually culminated in India’s independence under the guidance of Mahatma Gandhi.

Kovind said that Mahatma Gandhi not only provided leadership to India’s freedom struggle but also showed a new path, a new thinking and a new philosophy to the whole world.

The President said that the history of Gujarat is unique. This land of Mahatma Gandhi and Sardar Patel can be called the land of Satyagraha. The mantra of Satyagraha was established as an unfailing weapon against colonialism all over the world.

Bardoli Satyagraha, Salt Movement and Dandi March not only gave a new shape to our freedom struggle but also gave a new dimension to the expression of protest and the conduct of the mass movement.

He said that Sardar Patel gave independent India its unified form and strengthened the foundation of administration. His statue ‘the Statue of Unity’ on the banks of Narmada, which is the tallest statue in the world, is a small gift from a grateful nation in his memory. His stature in the hearts of the people of India is even higher than that.

The President said that apart from politics, Gujarat has also played an important role in cultural, social and economic fields.