Youth Building Peace: You’re not ‘future leaders’. You’re leaders today.

The clock is ticking. There’s no time to doze off.

Let’s make it clear and point-blank: the world needs you terribly. In fact, you’re irreplaceable at any cost. Period.

Please don’t take it the wrong way. I;m not trying to wake you up? I just want to remind you those days when you saw yourself as a Superhero, a changemaker, where you could bring peace to the whole world with your one fist! I want to remind you that it’s time and your are needed in the field.

You’re not ‘future leaders’. You’re leaders today.

It’s one extreme to talk about the people who starved and starving, dead and dying, living in the near hell, throughout the countries of northeastern Nigeria, Somalia, South Sudan, and Yemen. It’s completely another extreme to tackle the issue of youth in the developing countries like India, Pakistan, and Bangladesh.

1.8 billion people, i.e. 1/4th of the world’s population is youth! But the importance of recognizing youth as a key role in discouraging and resolving these conflicts is highly underrated.

Youth is seen as the agents of criminal and political violence. Not as agents of change.

They’re either viewed as vulnerable, powerless, immature and in need of protection — or feared as dangerous and as threats to security. Not as heroes who would put their own lives at stake in order to save someone in crises.

We, as youth, need to rise and reshape this perception. We need to stop listening to those who say, ‘you’re future leaders’, and start finding ourselves as ‘leaders today’ and help other youth recognize it too.

This can’t be avoided, because we’ve bigger challenges: to eradicate our poverty, create new technologies and solutions through entrepreneurship, and become able to look out for the world and help those who are helpless.

Let’s make the world know that you and I represent Energy, Imagination and Initiatives.

There’s enormous potential in Indian youth to build and keep peace in the world through initiatives like this. The storm of change is brewing and will transform the world in ways we can’t yet imagine.

Actively involving youth in maintaining peace and security, inspiring them to recognize that they’re the holistic solution, the key to building and sustaining peace is the call of the hour.

Let’s share this message with our fellow youngsters. Let’s remind ourselves that the world is one family and we’re going to keep it safe.

United Nations declared August 12 as the International Youth Day.

With the theme, “Youth Building Peace” International Youth Day 2017 “is dedicated to celebrating young people’s contributions to conflict prevention and transformation as well as inclusion, social justice, and sustainable peace.”

Image credits: Wikimedia Commons, Google Images (Labelled for reuse)