Joy of Learning Languages

At the Government High School in Larkana in mid fifties, we were required to learn three languages simultaneously—Sindhi, Urdu and English. I hated it! Learning of three languages took too much time. It seemed like wastage of time. That time could have been used to learn more maths or more science or civics or so many other things.

It was only much later that I realized that it was important to learn Sindhi, because it was my mother tongue. Urdu, because it was the national language of Pakistan. English, because it was the language of higher learning and business. The languages became useful soon. Looking back, I enjoyed reading and understanding of Bhitai’s poetry because of Sindhi. Sain Wahid Bux Shaikh, our headmaster made a good use of English in explaining poetry of Shakespeare and other wonderful poets. Urdu opened doors to wonderful novels by Nasim Hijazi (Shaheen, Mohammid Bin Qasim and many more). Urdu also opened doors to many school and college friendships.

Later when I went to DJ Science College, Karachi in 1958, my knowledge of Urdu opened many doors. I can think of at least one Sindhi friend, who did not do so well at DJ College and in Karachi because he was not fluent in Urdu.

Knowledge of English made it possible to secure admission in an American College while I was still in Inter Science. I owe a lot to my English teachers in Larkana and Karachi for my relatively easy adjustment at the University of Illinois (1961-64) and subsequent carrier development. Urdu became useful in USA. There was no other Sindhi at the University of Illinois back in 1961. There were five or six Pakistanis. Urdu became the language of communication with them. There were many Indians though. It was there that I realized that there was small difference in spoken Urdu and Hindi. All of a sudden, I realized that I knew a lot of spoken Hindi. I got to know many Indians. I had imagined all of them to be enemies while in Pakistan. But I found that there was so much in common with them. My knowledge of Urdu and then Hindi made it possible to find that big secret.

I did not need any other language until I joined the World Bank in 1967. During early years, I worked on projects in several counties such as Syria, Singapore, Thailand, Malawi, and Ghana etc, where English was sufficient. However, in mid seventies, I had to travel to some francophone African countries such as Upper Volta (now known as Burkina Faso), Mali, Guinea, Ivory Coast, and Senegal etc. Knowledge of French became necessary. They taught me a fair amount at the World Bank’s own language institute. It was a good start but not a sufficient one. I went to Alliance Francais in Paris for a month to focus on conversation. It was a full immersion course. By the end of the month, believe me, I was dreaming in French. It was a lifesaver.

I remember a visit to Upper Volta around 1978 to discuss implementation of a telecommunication project. The final project review meeting was with the Minister of Telecommunications. I knew that he knew English. So I started speaking in English. But he refused. He insisted on speaking in French. It was my first “French only meeting at a senior level”. It was a detailed meeting lasting over an hour focusing on their national policy and specific project detail. I was nervous as hell. The meeting was over. The minister and the World Bank’s Resident Representative (who was a French speaking Moroccan) started to clap. We were all happy that the meeting went well.
In 1982, I was transferred to East Asia region. Among other places, I started visiting Indonesia. There was no real need to learn the local language, which is called Bahasa Indonesia. Every one that I met in Jakarta or provincial capitals knew good or broken English. On my 20th or so visit, I was at a nightspot with other World Bank friends. The locals were talking and laughing in small groups. I did not understand a single word. It struck me! I was in their country but not part of their personal world. I decided to try to learn Bahasa. I started lessons at the World Bank Institute in Washington and practiced in evening in Indonesia. It really opened up a new and wonderful world. Later, while visiting Malaysia, I realized that Bahasa Malaysia is very similar to Bahasa Indonesia—just like Urdu and Sindhi.

During my two month long visits to Dominican Republic, I engaged a teacher for learning Spanish. I was told that I had good pronunciation in Spanish. It has some common sounds to Arabic and Sindhi. I hope to learn more of Spanish.

I have many efforts to learn Arabic. It was one of my subjects in pre-matric. I learnt the words but the grammar was impossible. I gave it up and did not have it in matric. Then during my posting to Saudi Arabia (1978-80), I took lessons. I could communicate with local staff and say simple sentences in the bazaars. I continued the effort during my posting in Somalia in 1981. Subsequently, I keep trying—through reading Quran and its translation simultaneously. I keep struggling. Fortunately, my Arab friends speak English. However, while wandering in bazaars of Cairo or Bahrain, I do not know what common people are talking about. One of my biggest desires is to become more fluent in Arabic.

After matric, I really took Sindhi for granted. I spoke it during visits to Pakistan. There was not much practice until I got married in 1967 and began to speak Sindhi at home in Washington on regular basis. My children who are all born in Washington learnt some Sindhi. They got good practice during frequent visits to the family in Pakistan. Today, the understand Sindhi but unfortunately do not speak much of it.

I began to appreciate Sindhi as I became aware of Sindh issues. As I have noted many injustices and poverty of masses in Sindh, I have become more devoted. It is my mother tongue. I cannot forget it. I am glad to be a part of the struggle to revive Sindhi language and Sindhi people. May God help us all.

What it takes to be rich (Money)

Beverly Hills, Calif. 90210
How Harvey Jason made his own luck
Lesson 1: Create your own opportunities. The British expatriate who owns Mystery Pier Books, got his revelation on a movie set with Steven Spielberg. (more)
• Paradise Valley, Ariz. 85352: Bob Grosnoff succeeded by making others lucky too

Westport, Conn. 06880
Carole Reichhelm scoops up waterfront property
Lesson 2: Have a growth mind-set. Reichhelm and others have a knack for identifying things other people covet. (more)

Atherton, Calif. 94027
Rich Miletic: from mowing lawns to CEO
Lesson 2, Corollary 1: Never stop learning. Miletic left a safe, corporate path to get valuable leadership experience. (more)

Lake Forest, Ill. 60045
Ron Irvine seizes his chance
Lesson 2, Corollary 2: Calculate your risk. Leaving a comfortable corporate job to be a consultant wasn't as much of a gamble as it seems. (more)

Do you have what it takes?
American business lore is filled with tales of visionaries taking insane risks in pursuit of a distant dream – and then striking it rich. In fact, the rich look a lot like you. Money Magazine's Josh Hyatt debunks 5 myths to show you what really drives success. (more)

How to Become As Rich As Bill Gates

How to Become As Rich As Bill Gates
a strange offshoot of the Bill Gates Personal Wealth Clock by Philip Greenspun
As a graduate student in computer science at MIT earning a $1600/month research stipend, I feel amply qualified to instruct the entire Internet on the art of becoming as rich as Bill Gates (check the Wealth Clock to see how much he has right now). I get my confidence from Dr. Leo Buscaglia, author of Love, Born for Love : Reflections on Loving, Living, Loving and Learning, and Bus 9 to Paradise. Dr. Buscaglia, our nation's most prominent lecturer on the subject of love, turns out to be divorced ("it was a very loving divorce").
Lesson 1: Choose Your Grandparents Carefully
"There are three ways to make money. You can inherit it. You can marry it. You can steal it."-- conventional wisdom in Italy William Henry Gates III made his best decision on October 28, 1955, the night he was born. He chose J.W. Maxwell as his great-grandfather. Maxwell founded Seattle's National City Bank in 1906. His son, James Willard Maxwell was also a banker and established a million-dollar trust fund for William (Bill) Henry Gates III.
In some of the later lessons, you will be encouraged to take entrepreneurial risks. You may find it comforting to remember that at any time you can fall back on a trust fund worth many millions of 1998 dollars.
Lesson 2: Choose Your Parents Carefully
"A young man asked an old rich man how he made his money. The old guy fingered his worsted wool vest and said, "Well, son, it was 1932. The depth of the Great Depression. I was down to my last nickel. I invested that nickel in an apple. I spent the entire day polishing the apple and, at the end of the day, I sold the apple for ten cents. The next morning, I invested those ten cents in two apples. I spent the entire day polishing them and sold them at 5 pm for 20 cents. I continued this system for a month, by the end of which I'd accumulated a fortune of $1.37. Then my wife's father died and left us two million dollars." William Henry Gates, Jr. and Mary Maxwell were among Seattle's social and financial elite. Bill Gates, Jr. was a prominent corporate lawyer while Mary Maxwell was a board member of First Interstate Bank and Pacific Northwest Bell. She was also on the national board of United Way, along with John Opel, the chief executive officer of IBM who approved the inclusion of MS/DOS with the original IBM PC.
Remind your parents not to send you to public school. Bill Gates went to Lakeside, Seattle's most exclusive prep school where tuition in 1967 was $5,000 (Harvard tuition that year was $1760). Typical classmates included the McCaw brothers, who sold the cellular phone licenses they obtained from the U.S. Government to AT&T for $11.5 billion in 1994. When the kids there wanted to use a computer, they got their moms to hold a rummage sale and raise $3,000 to buy time on a DEC PDP-10, the same machine used by computer science researchers at Stanford and MIT.
Note: Recall that in the 1980s we venerated Donald Trump and studied his "art of the deal". If Donald Trump had taken the millions he inherited from his father and put it all into mutual funds, you'd never have had to suffer through one of his books. But he'd be just about as rich today.
Lesson 3: Acquire Research Results by Hiring and Buying Conventional (loser) economic wisdom holds that monopolies should spend heavily on research because they are in a position to capture the fruits of the research. But if you want to become as rich as Bill Gates, you have to remember that it is cheaper to wait for a small company to come up with something good and then buy them. In the old days, antitrust laws kept monopolies from buying potential competitors. But not anymore. When Microsoft products were threatened by network computers and Web-based applications, they simply bought WebTV and Hotmail.
Another good strategy is to hire the right people. Some of the guys who wrote Microsoft Windows had previous worked on window systems at Xerox PARC. So Xerox paid for the research; Microsoft paid only for development.
In the long run a tech company without research probably can't sustain its market leadership. So you'll eventually need to build something like research.microsoft.com (check out netscan.research.microsoft.com to see some interesting online community research).
Lesson 4: Let Other People Do the Programming If you're a great engineer, it can be frustrating to rely on other people to translate your ideas into reality. However, keep in mind that the entire Indian subcontinent is learning Java. And that if Microsoft, Oracle, SAP, and Sun products simply worked and worked simply, half of the world's current IT workers would be out of a job. You're not going to get rich being "just a coder." Especially working in painful low-level imperative languages such as C or Java. It might be worth writing your own SQL queries and HTML pages since these tend to be compact and easier than precisely specifying the work for another person to do. But basically you need to get good at thinking about whether a piece of software is doing something useful for the adopting organization and end-user. Bill Gates does code reviews, not coding.
[If you aren't sure that you need to be filthy rich and like to do some coding, see this old misguided article for more about what it might mean to be a great software engineer.]
Lesson 5: Train your new CEO If you're an intelligent curious person it can be painful to run a company of more than 50 people. You spend more time than you'd like repeating yourself, sitting in boring meetings, skimming over long legal documents in which you know there are errors but aren't sure how serious, etc. The temptation is to hand over the reins to the first "professional manager" who comes along. And that's what the standard venture capitalist formula dictates. But Bill Gates didn't do that. He hired Steve Ballmer in 1980 and gave him the CEO job 20 years later. Making money in the software products business requires domain expertise and a commitment to solving problems within that domain. Great tech companies are seldom built by non-technical management or professional managers who aren't committed to anything more than their paycheck. Adobe is another good example. The two founders were PhD computer science researchers from Xerox PARC who were passionate about solving problems in the publishing and graphics world. They are still guiding operations at Adobe.
Note that this is a principle that Old Economy companies have long understood. Jack Welch joined GE in 1961 and became CEO 20 years later. Sometimes an Old Economy company may pull in a few outsiders to senior positions but, because they have such stable bureaucracies underneath, they can more easily afford this than startups.
See Charles Ferguson's High Stakes, No Prisoners (1999) for a longer explanation of how hired-gun CEOs manage to kill software products companies.
Lesson 6: Focus on Profit
"At Hewlett-Packard, people, materials, facilities, money, and time are the resources available to us for conducting our business. By applying our skills, we turn these resources into useful products and services. If we do a good job, customers pay us more for our products than the sum of our costs in producing and distributing them. This difference, our profit, represents the value we add to the resources we utilize." -- David Packard in The HP Way Remembering to make a profit was tough in the dotcom 1990s but it turns out that Hewlett and Packard's ideas were right. Most of the management teams at dotcom businesses, by being disorganized, unintelligent, and ignorant, were subtracting value from the resources that they controlled.
How does one make money in the software products business? Simple. The necessary step is to build something that becomes part of information systems that generate value for organizations and end-users. Once you've created value you can extract a portion in lots of ways. You can be closed-source and charge a license fee. You can be open-source and charge for training, service, support, and extensions. But if you aren't getting your software product into important information systems, you don't have a prayer, no matter how slick your marketing materials.
If you're creative and diligent the software products business is extremely lucrative. If you're losing money, ask yourself what you're doing wrong. The answer is probably "plenty".
Lesson 7: Let the Venture Capitalists Schmooze Wall Street ...... but don't let them run your company. A profitable Microsoft Corporation brought in venture capitalists (VCs) at the last minute. They didn't need or spend the money but used the VCs to boost their valuation at the initial public offering, thus getting more money for the shares that they sold. Venture capitalists are dangerous because even the most successful might not know anything about business. Remember that there are tens of thousands of venture capitalists in this world. Assuming that they make random choices of companies in which to invest there will be a Gaussian curve of performance. Some firms will do consistently better than average even if everyone is guessing. Imagine that thousands of monkeys are flipping coins; some of the monkeys will get 10 heads in a row. These are the monkeys that will be celebrated for their insight. These are the monkeys whose track records will lead to uncritical cheerleading by underwriters and public investors. In bull markets such as we had in the 1990s nearly all the monkeys will be fairly consistent winners. But remember your next-door neighbor who made money in the stock market in 1985. He convinced himself that he had special insight and ability when actually he was only holding high-beta stocks in a rising market. So his foray into the commodities futures market wiped him out in the crash of '87.
Bottom line: successful software products companies spend most of their time listening to their customers and users rather than to venture capitalists.
[See "Money, Money, Money (and Investing)" for how the Gaussian curve works for mutual fund managers and also read Princeton Professor Burton Malkiel's A Random Walk Down Wall Street.]
Lesson 8: Self-Esteem is Not Job 1Gentility, politesse, decorum, and high self-esteem are wonderful. You can achieve all of these things within your organization. And then watch it be destroyed by competitors where frank and, if necessary, harsh criticism is encouraged. Technical people, even (and especially) those fresh out of school are always convinced that whatever they've developed, no matter how hare-brained, is perfect. It takes a technical person with good judgement to notice the flaws and it may require repeated and increasingly harsh delivery for the, uh, pinhead to realize his or her mistake.
Example: I once encountered a group of 6 people who called themselves "engineers." To solve what they thought was a new problem, they were going to build their own little database management system with their own query language that was SQL-like without being SQL. I pointed them to some published research by a gang of PhD computer scientists from IBM Almaden, the same lab that developed the RDBMS and SQL to begin with in the 1970s. The research had been done over a five-year period and yet they hadn't become aware of it during several months of planning. I pointed them to the SQL-99 standard wherein this IBM research approach of augmenting a standard RDBMS to solve the problem they were attacking was becoming an ISO standard. They ignored it and spent another few months trying to build their enormously complex architecture. Exasperated, I got a kid fresh out of school to code up some Java stored procedures to run inside Oracle. After a week he had his system working and ready for open-source release, something that the team of 6 "engineers" hadn't been able to accomplish in 6 months of full-time work. Yet they never accepted that they were going about things in the wrong way though eventually they did give up on the project.
An 1994 New Yorker article about Microsoft relates "If he strongly disagrees with what you're saying, [Gates] is in the habit of blurting out, 'That's the stupidest fucking thing I've ever heard!'". Jennifer New, a former Microsoft contractor, writes "Meetings with Bill or one of his top people are often replete with a barrage of expletives and other disdainful comments." (Salon, September 1997) My friends who work or have worked at Microsoft tell similar tales. But how different is this from other elite organizations?
When I arrived at MIT as a first-year graduate student in electrical engineering and computer science, I asked a professor for help with a research problem. He said "The reason that you've having trouble is that you don't know anything and you're not working very hard." A friend of mine was a surgery resident at Johns Hopkins. He complained to one of his teachers that he was having trouble concentrating because he'd been up all night for several nights in a row. The professor replied "Oh... does your pussy hurt?" According to Business Week, Jack Welch "encouraged near-brutal candor in the meetings he held [at GE]".
The bottom line: self-esteem is great but beware of creating a cozy home for unproductive people with bad ideas.
MorePlato addresses some of these issues in the first book of The Republic (available online from www.gutenberg.net). Socrates asserts that people who've inherited fortunes tend to be light with their money but that people who've made their fortunes "have a second love of money as a creation of their own, resembling the affection of authors for their own poems, or of parents for their children, besides that natural love of it for the sake of use and profit which is common to them and all men. And hence they are very bad company, for they can talk about nothing but the praises of wealth."
Socrates asks Cephalus, a wealthy old man, "What do you consider to be the greatest blessing which you have reaped from your wealth?" Cephalus replies that "The great blessing of riches, I do not say to every man, but to a good man, is, that he has had no occasion to deceive or to defraud others, either intentionally or unintentionally."
In the Decameron, Boccaccio writes "If you really want to make the big bucks, what you really need is a monopoly on the desktop operating system. But the Sherman Antitrust Act, 15 U.S.C. § 1 and 2, and Clayton Antitrust Act, 15 U.S.C. § 25, are real bitches."
SourcesGood sources of facts about Bill Gates and Microsoft are the following books:
Hard Drive (James Wallace and Jim Erickson; 1992)
Overdrive (James Wallace; 1992)
Gates : How Microsoft's Mogul Reinvented an Industry-And Made Himself the Richest Man in America (Stephen Manes, Paul Andrews 1994)
How the Web Was Won : How Bill Gates and His Internet Idealists Transformed the Microsoft Empire (Paul Andrews 1999)
High Stakes, No Prisoners (Charles Ferguson 1999) explains how Microsoft crushed Netscape
if you don't feel like reading Project Gutenberg's version on-line, you can pick up a paperback copy of Robin Waterfield's translation of The Republic

Role of American Sindhis in Development of Sindh

Saifullah Shaikh Dear Munwar and Friends,
I agree---and you stated in your last sentence-----"itis time to act and contribute".
1.According to one source inSANA------we have more than 300 Sindhi Physicians ,andmore than 300 other professionals in addition tobusiness men + others with good earnings eachyear-----belonging to Sindhi community OR SANA here inthe USA.
2.I have a lot of Christian /and few Jewish friendsalong with people belonging to Agha khan community ofSindh i-e Agha khanis---------it came to myinformation that all those individuals r contributing5-10 % of their income on regular basis to theircommunities/community centres/businesscommittees/schools/legal associations to protect theirrights/religious or worship centers/and theircommunity libraries------here in the USA in citieswhere they live. Now we can imagine why they r wellorganised,mature and strong----day by day.
3.On the scaleof 1------10,---------they r between 5 to 10----justfor example,( to convey my point and message in properand effective manner). They r collecting millions eachmonth very easily from their ownpeople/individuals/communities voluntarily andhappily. In addition they have already prepared a widerange of workers and volunteers for their communitywork/devolpment.
4.We Sindhis r wasting more than 10%(of our income)each year on useless items/things--------IN THE NAMEOF fAMILY,Children and other personalactivities----and many times very proud of thislavishly life style?!!!Why, because we r NorthAmerican Sindhis! better than our own brothers andsisters back home in Sindh!!?.
5.Now as a comparison,------onthe scale of 1-----10--where we sindhis stand today??Are we even at level 1 or 2 ? in terms ofcontribution,community work and force,volunteerorganization.
6.According to initial preliminary estimate-----if westart today (all professionals and business people ofSANA) TO CONTRIBUTE FINANCIALLY only 1% of theiryearly income and divert our wasted income/resourcesto permanent cause and project/s of SANA (TO BEDISCUSSED LATER ON)--------i m more than 100% surethat we can collect 500,000 dollars each year as apermanent Fund for SANA-----in order tolaunch/initiate new useful projects inside Sindh veryeffectively with speedy results.
7. Are we Sindhis ready andwilling to achieve even this level 1(low level on thescale of 1---10) while comparing ourselves e.g to Aghakhanis belonging to our own Sindh where they r moreeffective and more organized than us(they r notconsidering themselves Sindhis any more!!!!!).
8.I m requestingall my Seniors/members/well wishers(all SANAcommunity)----please come forward and start thismovement of 1% pledge for our Homeland and poorSindhis--------in this way we will prepare veryeffective force of volunteers/community workers asother non-Sindhi communities r functioning in Sindhand here in the USA.In this manner we may influenceeven Political Parties inside Sindh when we get strongfinancially.
9.After this(Phase one)discussions-------we may startdiscussions for different project/s inside Sindh(Phasetwo)later on,if we can agree on Phase one.Even thesedifferent projects would make us(SANA) more strongfinancially each year(profitable projects).
THIS SHOULD BEOUR (PRAGMATIC)APPROACH instead of talking useless,time-consuming and dividing issues for nothing butpersonal hidden motives. I think,it is time to get rid ofempty slogans and to say good-bye(forever)to thisself-imposed culture of KECHEHRI(wasting oftime)-----in order to make Sindhi-community/SANAfinancially sound and prosperous so that in nearfuture we may have network of communitycenters,volunteers force,centers for woman and adulteducation back-home(i-e inside Sindh).
At the same time,weneed to realize that time is very precious for Sindhisnow----therefore I appeal allsincere/seniors/well-established North-AmericanSindhis to come forward and stop this process ofPersonal Glorification/Egoism -------we need toinitiate a movement now ,and I would like to call/termthis 1% Pledge(as solemn promise)and 1% movement formotherland Sindh.
May Allah Bless our Sindh.
Saifullah Shaikh.
--- munwar soomro wrote: Dear friends, During my 7 years with SANA i have seen that we have been able to do very little for our Sindh. Given the alarming political and economic situation of Sindhi people we need to do more. Lets see why we have been unable to do that and how we can do it.
The main reasons why we have been unable to make it :
1- Lack of unity and - which is due to some folks who unfortunately aim at that and as people dont want to get involved in useless and irritating discussions they shy away.
2- lack of proper planning and proactiveness We can definitely address the first issue by tightening up the rope. The other issue of planning is very important. What we have been doing is creating too many committees for too many things, education, human rights, language, cultural, son on... Sindhis are few in number and active people are even limited.
What we need to do is, identify a potential area/project and work on it proactively. That should be the main task of the EC. The main body should concentrate on that project and may get help from others when needed. So that the fruit of the effort could be achieved soon and that builds confidence and you get more help and funding. We know that even though we are few in number but still there are good people who want to help given that there is a credible organizaiton working in sindh. We need to create that with the help of SANA or may be sana itself involved in projects.
For example we can select one or two of these fields to start with: Schools, Lobbying , Awareness, Improving atmosphere in Universities etc. Now i give details.
We can open primary schools teaching sindhi and english together establishing high standards. Every one know education is basic for everything. Lobbying, is that we talk to the sindhi and pakistani politicians, organize seminars, make leaders at all the levels feel that they should not think sindhis are not alone, and eventually getting more for sindhis in all areas ( i am glad SANA has already started that and we need to formalize its objectives).
By awareness i mean creating awareness among the masses that why the problems are piling up, what is the solution and who is who what is what. This is no surprise that even many educated people back home dont have clear sight and solution in mind. Of course we should tell them by working with newspapers (especially sindhi news papers) that all these sardars, waders, and selfish leaders have taken them to this point where there is no help for them. And create awareness that we can solve or get our problems solved by voting properly and also correcting ourselves.
Lastly we can target and visit universities by ourselves and talk to students, parties, administration and try to forge a unity among the student organizations. Also telling them that how we are harming ourselves by destroying educational institutions and standards and that how we can get jobs and what is the world trend.
We should start with one or max two projects and whole of SANA and EC should work proactively on the agenda. I dont see why we can not contribute to it moraly, financially and technically, if all sana leadership starts working proactively on that and produce results.
I think we have wasted lots of precious time on discussions this is time to act and contribute. regards, Munwar Soomro

Universal Declaration of Human Rights

Universal Declaration of Human Rights
(other language versions)
Adopted and proclaimed by General Assembly resolution 217 A (III) of 10 December 1948
On December 10, 1948 the General Assembly of the United Nations adopted and proclaimed the Universal Declaration of Human Rights the full text of which appears in the following pages. Following this historic act the Assembly called upon all Member countries to publicize the text of the Declaration and "to cause it to be disseminated, displayed, read and expounded principally in schools and other educational institutions, without distinction based on the political status of countries or territories."PREAMBLE
Whereas recognition of the inherent dignity and of the equal and inalienable rights of all members of the human family is the foundation of freedom, justice and peace in the world,
Whereas disregard and contempt for human rights have resulted in barbarous acts which have outraged the conscience of mankind, and the advent of a world in which human beings shall enjoy freedom of speech and belief and freedom from fear and want has been proclaimed as the highest aspiration of the common people,
Whereas it is essential, if man is not to be compelled to have recourse, as a last resort, to rebellion against tyranny and oppression, that human rights should be protected by the rule of law,
Whereas it is essential to promote the development of friendly relations between nations,
Whereas the peoples of the United Nations have in the Charter reaffirmed their faith in fundamental human rights, in the dignity and worth of the human person and in the equal rights of men and women and have determined to promote social progress and better standards of life in larger freedom,
Whereas Member States have pledged themselves to achieve, in co-operation with the United Nations, the promotion of universal respect for and observance of human rights and fundamental freedoms,
Whereas a common understanding of these rights and freedoms is of the greatest importance for the full realization of this pledge,Now, Therefore THE GENERAL ASSEMBLY proclaims THIS UNIVERSAL DECLARATION OF HUMAN RIGHTS as a common standard of achievement for all peoples and all nations, to the end that every individual and every organ of society, keeping this Declaration constantly in mind, shall strive by teaching and education to promote respect for these rights and freedoms and by progressive measures, national and international, to secure their universal and effective recognition and observance, both among the peoples of Member States themselves and among the peoples of territories under their jurisdiction.
Article 1.
All human beings are born free and equal in dignity and rights.They are endowed with reason and conscience and should act towards one another in a spirit of brotherhood.
Article 2.
Everyone is entitled to all the rights and freedoms set forth in this Declaration, without distinction of any kind, such as race, colour, sex, language, religion, political or other opinion, national or social origin, property, birth or other status. Furthermore, no distinction shall be made on the basis of the political, jurisdictional or international status of the country or territory to which a person belongs, whether it be independent, trust, non-self-governing or under any other limitation of sovereignty.
Article 3.
Everyone has the right to life, liberty and security of person.
Article 4.
No one shall be held in slavery or servitude; slavery and the slave trade shall be prohibited in all their forms.
Article 5.
No one shall be subjected to torture or to cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment.
Article 6.
Everyone has the right to recognition everywhere as a person before the law.
Article 7.
All are equal before the law and are entitled without any discrimination to equal protection of the law. All are entitled to equal protection against any discrimination in violation of this Declaration and against any incitement to such discrimination.
Article 8.
Everyone has the right to an effective remedy by the competent national tribunals for acts violating the fundamental rights granted him by the constitution or by law.
Article 9.
No one shall be subjected to arbitrary arrest, detention or exile.
Article 10.
Everyone is entitled in full equality to a fair and public hearing by an independent and impartial tribunal, in the determination of his rights and obligations and of any criminal charge against him.
Article 11.
(1) Everyone charged with a penal offence has the right to be presumed innocent until proved guilty according to law in a public trial at which he has had all the guarantees necessary for his defence.
(2) No one shall be held guilty of any penal offence on account of any act or omission which did not constitute a penal offence, under national or international law, at the time when it was committed. Nor shall a heavier penalty be imposed than the one that was applicable at the time the penal offence was committed.
Article 12.
No one shall be subjected to arbitrary interference with his privacy, family, home or correspondence, nor to attacks upon his honour and reputation. Everyone has the right to the protection of the law against such interference or attacks.
Article 13.
(1) Everyone has the right to freedom of movement and residence within the borders of each state.
(2) Everyone has the right to leave any country, including his own, and to return to his country.
Article 14.
(1) Everyone has the right to seek and to enjoy in other countries asylum from persecution.
(2) This right may not be invoked in the case of prosecutions genuinely arising from non-political crimes or from acts contrary to the purposes and principles of the United Nations.
Article 15.
(1) Everyone has the right to a nationality.
(2) No one shall be arbitrarily deprived of his nationality nor denied the right to change his nationality.
Article 16.
(1) Men and women of full age, without any limitation due to race, nationality or religion, have the right to marry and to found a family. They are entitled to equal rights as to marriage, during marriage and at its dissolution.
(2) Marriage shall be entered into only with the free and full consent of the intending spouses.
(3) The family is the natural and fundamental group unit of society and is entitled to protection by society and the State.
Article 17.
(1) Everyone has the right to own property alone as well as in association with others.
(2) No one shall be arbitrarily deprived of his property.
Article 18.
Everyone has the right to freedom of thought, conscience and religion; this right includes freedom to change his religion or belief, and freedom, either alone or in community with others and in public or private, to manifest his religion or belief in teaching, practice, worship and observance.
Article 19.
Everyone has the right to freedom of opinion and expression; this right includes freedom to hold opinions without interference and to seek, receive and impart information and ideas through any media and regardless of frontiers.
Article 20.
(1) Everyone has the right to freedom of peaceful assembly and association.
(2) No one may be compelled to belong to an association.
Article 21.
(1) Everyone has the right to take part in the government of his country, directly or through freely chosen representatives.
(2) Everyone has the right of equal access to public service in his country.
(3) The will of the people shall be the basis of the authority of government; this will shall be expressed in periodic and genuine elections which shall be by universal and equal suffrage and shall be held by secret vote or by equivalent free voting procedures.
Article 22.
Everyone, as a member of society, has the right to social security and is entitled to realization, through national effort and international co-operation and in accordance with the organization and resources of each State, of the economic, social and cultural rights indispensable for his dignity and the free development of his personality.
Article 23.
(1) Everyone has the right to work, to free choice of employment, to just and favourable conditions of work and to protection against unemployment.
(2) Everyone, without any discrimination, has the right to equal pay for equal work.
(3) Everyone who works has the right to just and favourable remuneration ensuring for himself and his family an existence worthy of human dignity, and supplemented, if necessary, by other means of social protection.
(4) Everyone has the right to form and to join trade unions for the protection of his interests.
Article 24.
Everyone has the right to rest and leisure, including reasonable limitation of working hours and periodic holidays with pay.
Article 25.
(1) Everyone has the right to a standard of living adequate for the health and well-being of himself and of his family, including food, clothing, housing and medical care and necessary social services, and the right to security in the event of unemployment, sickness, disability, widowhood, old age or other lack of livelihood in circumstances beyond his control.
(2) Motherhood and childhood are entitled to special care and assistance. All children, whether born in or out of wedlock, shall enjoy the same social protection.
Article 26.
(1) Everyone has the right to education. Education shall be free, at least in the elementary and fundamental stages. Elementary education shall be compulsory. Technical and professional education shall be made generally available and higher education shall be equally accessible to all on the basis of merit.
(2) Education shall be directed to the full development of the human personality and to the strengthening of respect for human rights and fundamental freedoms. It shall promote understanding, tolerance and friendship among all nations, racial or religious groups, and shall further the activities of the United Nations for the maintenance of peace.
(3) Parents have a prior right to choose the kind of education that shall be given to their children.
Article 27.
(1) Everyone has the right freely to participate in the cultural life of the community, to enjoy the arts and to share in scientific advancement and its benefits.
(2) Everyone has the right to the protection of the moral and material interests resulting from any scientific, literary or artistic production of which he is the author.
Article 28.
Everyone is entitled to a social and international order in which the rights and freedoms set forth in this Declaration can be fully realized.
Article 29.
(1) Everyone has duties to the community in which alone the free and full development of his personality is possible.
(2) In the exercise of his rights and freedoms, everyone shall be subject only to such limitations as are determined by law solely for the purpose of securing due recognition and respect for the rights and freedoms of others and of meeting the just requirements of morality, public order and the general welfare in a democratic society.
(3) These rights and freedoms may in no case be exercised contrary to the purposes and principles of the United Nations.
Article 30.
Nothing in this Declaration may be interpreted as implying for any State, group or person any right to engage in any activity or to perform any act aimed at the destruction of any of the rights and freedoms set forth herein.