​ YOUTH AND PATRIOTISM

INTRODUCTION:

Youth is best defined as that transition period of a person’s life where he transforms from a
dependent child to an independent adult. Due to this reason, youth cannot be categorised as a
fixed age group. It is more fluid in nature than other age groups. It is mostly defined in terms of
the relationship between education and employment. It is referred to a person between the age
of leaving compulsory education and finding their first job. Though the term youth cannot be
defined in terms of age, United Nations defines youth as the age between 15-24 years for the
purpose of easy understanding and generalisation.

Patriotism, generally speaking is the cultural attachment to one’s homeland or devotion to one’s
country. The term patriotism can be defined differently in different geographical locations.
Though the meanings can vary across the globe, the term patriotism refers to the concept of
nationalism.

Patriotism is the love for one’s country and the desire to make it better. It is contrasted with
simple nationalism (or jingoism) in that nationalism and jingoism represent a blind loyalty to
one's country even when it wrong (an example would be the people of Nazi Germany).
Patriotism, on the other hand, recognizes when its nation is wrong and fights to correct the
wrong even as it supports that nation.

Patriotism is important in the lives of youth today for several reasons. One is because the youth
of today will inherit the nation tomorrow. If youth do not become involved in making our nation
better, they may not receive a nation worth inheriting. Second, the nation built by today's youth
will be the nation they pass along to their own children. If young people today wish their children
to have an America of freedom, the young people of today must protect and defend that
freedom by supporting our country's greatness and working to make her ever better. Third, the
youth of today owe a debt to those of the past who sacrificed, worked hard, and even died to
build us a free nation. To keep faith with those who have gone before and upon whose toil and
sacrifice the nation was built, youth need to show patriotism.

Patriotism can be expressed in various ways. The love for one’s country need not necessarily
be shown by laying down their lives for their motherland, though this is regarded as the supreme
expression of patriotism. Patriotism can be expressed in many ways. It can be expressed by
being a dutiful citizen, by paying taxes regularly, to live in peace and harmony with other
citizens, obeying the laws of the country and respecting it in every possible way.

Patriotism and India:

Patriotism is the great and selfless passion of love for one’s country. To a Indian patriot his
mother and motherland are superior even to heaven. An Indian Patriot is ever ready to lay down
his life in the service of his country, India. Patriotism is not mere passive love for the country. A
true patriot, who loves India, is an active worker. At He works heart and soul for the progress of
his India and countrymen.
Patriotism inspires a patriot to rise in revolt and tight for the freedom of his country. In a free
country like India, there are occasions when one has to sacrifice one’s personal pleasures and
even life for one’s country. A patriot always fights against the internal and external enemies of
his country. The black marketers, profiteers, criminals and anti-socials are all internal enemies
of India. A true Indian patriot tries to free his country from all these enemies. He also must try to
make his India free from poverty, ignorance and superstition.

Some of the most glorious chapters of Indian history have been written as well in the blood of
patriots. Rana Pratap, Tipu Sultan, Shivaji, Surya Sen, Netaji, Jatin Das — are all great patriots
to remember. Their patriotism is different from false patriotism which is a danger to a nation and
civilisation as a whole. A true patriot loves other countries as his own and wants to live in peace
with them. He does not think his country to be the best in the world.

There is no place of narrowness in the mind of a true patriot. He thinks himself as a citizen of
the world as a whole.

Our youth of the present generation is to be aware of the past which is glorious and lauded by
the global leaders and historical experts from many renowned countries. There is also a
challenge that we face in terms of keeping our connect and integrity intact with the ideologies
which are patriotic in nature. Today, we are living in a highly globalized and urbanized society
which has its reach to the global affairs and culture by means of media and other sophisticated
ways. The youth of today is not really exposed to the ideologies that are direct implications to
the patriotic thinking of national interests and the spirit of nationalism.

The post modern youth of India is being kept under dilemma by various interest groups in our
society who have a specific opinion about the culture that is linked to the patriotic thinking.
There is a notion that has been spread across the urban and rural areas calling the Indians to
Be Indian and Buy Indian or use Indian products or stand by the Indian culture in terms of
dressing and follow the professional path in a very traditional way. The youth in India today may
or may not be willing to be linked with this notion as this may be totally against the sense of
freedom as they perceive. There can be a balance achieved as far as this issue is concerned.
This is an issue about patriotism and definitely not about the culture.

The youth of our generation is as patriotic as our previous generations. They want to see India
on the top spot in every field. They have a maximum exposure to the global affairs and the
cultures around. They can easily find acceptance by neutralizing their culture which is not an
issue of patriotism, for instance the dressing sense to meet up with some civilization is not an
aberration to patriotism.

Patriotism in our present day context is to preserve the sovereignty of our country through
democracy and free speech to achieve a society that is fundamentally sound in its basics of
civilization. Culture is a subjective issue that need not be censored in the name of ‘’being an
Indian as ‘against to be an Indian’.

OBJECTIVES OF THE STUDY :

To study the attitude of youth towards India.

To compare patriotism among both genders of youth
To study the factors influencing patriotism among youth in India
To understand the beliefs that are prevalent among youth towards patriotism

METHODOLOGY:
The study uses both primary as well as secondary data. Primary data has been collected by
distributing questionnaires. The data collected from the questionnaire has been analysed by
using tools such as MS Excel. The questionnaires have been distributed in the city of Chennai.
The main variables that has been used are gender and age. This paper also tries to analyse the
patriotism among both the genders and gives a comparison of the both.

DATA ANALYSIS
The analysis of the questionnaire has given the following results.

Chart 1: From the analysis, we can see that culture and heritage comes to the mind of both the
genders when they think of India. Males value culture and heritage a little more than females.
Females seem to be more possessive about the society.

Chart 2: Both males and females like the country. Here again, it is seen that women like the
country more than men.

Chart 3: Women value culture and tradition more than men. Lifestyle of the country is equally
liked by both the genders. Both the genders like the country because of its culture and tradition.
Chart 4: Patriotism is maximum influenced by parents among both the genders, while in the
case of females, it is more influenced by parents than males. Patriotism influenced by schools
among males is more than females. Movies also influence patriotism among males more than
females

Chart 5: Both the genders show their patriotism by writing in print media. Men show patriotism
by giving public speeches. Women show patriotism by fighting against social evils and
developing the nation by being part of NGOs.

Chart 6: Both genders prefer to settle abroad equally.

Chart 7: The major reasons to settle abroad seems to be to get better career opportunities. Men
value career more than women. Women like to settle abroad to enjoy a better lifestyle. Men are
more money oriented than women.

Chart 8: Men seem to enjoy a greater level of freedom than women. Women have received
culture and tradition

Chart 9: Most men want to repay their country by being law abiding citizens. Women want to
repay their country by doing social work.

Chart 10: Both the genders are equally from an army background. Females seem to come from
a more army background than males.

Chart 11: Both the genders of youth consider corruption to be the major weakness of India.
Females think that politics is also one of the major weakness while males think poverty is
another major weakness.

Chart 12: Though most of the youths are optimistic about seeing India as a super power in
2020, there are still a handful of people who believe that situations might worsen.

Conclusion:

They youth today is a confused lot, as they like its culture and heritage and yet they are not
sure of how to value what this country has done for them. They are quite optimistic and are
always on a lookout for finding venues to voice their opinions. The youth today are very career
oriented and are ready to leave the nation for their career and education. The male today are
very aggressive and career oriented and are less attached to culture and heritage. The female
today is more attached to culture and tradition. They are more interested in changing the society
by social service. Family plays an important role in developing patriotism. The study shows that
females are more patriotic than males and this might be due to fact that there are more number
of females, who have an army background.