'Bharat Mata' is voice of every Indian: Rahul Gandhi on Independence Day

Penning a four-page message on Independence Day, Rahul referred to his 145-day Bharat Jodo Yatra from Kanyakumari to Kashmir and said India is "the happiness, the fear and the pain hidden deep inside all the voices".

Congress leader Rahul Gandhi on Tuesday said "Bharat Mata" is the voice of every single Indian, no matter how weak or strong.

Penning a four-page message on Independence Day, he referred to his 145-day Bharat Jodo Yatra from Kanyakumari to Kashmir and said India is "the happiness, the fear and the pain hidden deep inside all the voices".

"The object of my love had suddenly revealed herself. My beloved Bharat Mata was not a land. It wasn’t a set of ideas. It wasn’t a particular culture, history or religion. Neither was it the caste that people had been assigned. India was the voice of every single Indian, no matter how weak or strong. India was the happiness, the fear and the pain hidden deep inside all the voices," Rahul wrote.

"To hear India, my own voice - my desires - my ambitions had to fall silent. India would speak to one of her own, but only if one was humble and completely silent. How simple it had turned out to be. I had been looking in the river for that which could only be found in the sea," he said.

'Bharat Mata' was one of the themes Rahul invoked when he delivered his speech during the no-confidence motion against the Modi government last week after his Lok Sabha membership was reinstated.

Quoting Rumi to say "if words come from the heart they will enter the heart", Rahul referred to his interactions with a variety of people from various walks of life and how they impacted him.

Talking about the pain in his knees - caused by an old injury he suffered during his college days - which resurfaced as he started his yatra last September, Rahul said every time he thought about stopping or giving up, "someone would come and gift me the energy to continue".

"It was as if a silent energy kept helping me, and like fireflies in a dark forest, it was everywhere. When I really needed it, it was there to help and to guide. Then one day, I felt a silence I had never felt before. I could hear nothing but the voice of the person holding my hand and talking to me. The inner voice that had spoken to me ever since I was a little child was gone. It felt as if something had died," Rahul penned in his message.