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Democracy, soul of our country: Shekhawat

By Our Special Correspondent

NEW DELHI JAN. 10. The Vice-President, Bhairon Singh Shekhawat, today said that democracy was the soul of India and if the country could enshrine and enrich Indian democratic values at global level, democracies in the world would flourish.

Inaugurating the second PIO Parliamentarians Conference here, Mr. Shekhawat said democracy had promoted India's national character and it was perhaps the mature handling of democratic processes and the wide and deep democratic structure in the form of village panchayats, the local bodies, the cooperative institutions, the legislatures and Parliament, that India scored far ahead of several other countries ``which were democratic mainly in form, but not in substance''.

He cited his own example to drive home the point that in India, a person born in a poor family could become the Vice-President.

Today's Indian democracy was so strong and vibrant that a person belonging to the SC/ST community and poor women could contest elections and become a sarpanch or an MLA or an MP.

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