“What Freedom Asks”

India, to me, is more than a name,

A legacy forged in freedom’s flame.

She rose with cries of “Quit this land!”

And stood with wounds we didn’t plan.

But I ask—

Have we kept the promise made

By those who marched, unafraid?

Do we still hear their whispered plea,

To guard this gift of liberty?

She’s the tricolor in morning light,

The anthem sung with hearts upright.

She’s Bhagat’s fire, Gandhi’s peace,

A call for justice that mustn’t cease.

Yet in her lanes, where children roam,

Does every heart still find a home?

Is every voice, however small,

Free to rise, or doomed to fall?

She lives in books, in dusty schools,

In dreams beyond outdated rules.

In hands that build, in eyes that see,

The hope of what we still could be.

Oh India, land of million hues,

Your freedom asks for deeper dues.

Not just from flags on days of pride,

But in the truths we choose to hide.

Through my eyes, you shine and ache,

A land we love, a path we make.

The fight’s not past—it lives, it grows,

In every seed this future sows.