The Vice President, M. Venkaiah Naidu has said that India must use its moral and cultural strength to influence public opinion for establishing a truly peaceful, just and more equitable world order.Inaugurating a three-day conference on Soft Power, the Vice President said that soft power has been defined as the ability of nations to shape the preferences and influence the behavior of other nations through appeal and attraction as opposed to coercion. It includes the ability to affect others through persuasion, agenda-framing and positive attraction using culture, values, inherent knowledge, spirituality, wisdom and foreign policy, he added.

The Vice President observed that Soft Power represents one of the newest frameworks through which India could leverage its role in the international order. He said India has, from time immemorial, been one of the foremost cultural forces in the world and was known as Vishwaguru as it provided cultural, spiritual and intellectual leadership.

Calling for using Indias soft power to combat the biggest menace humanity was facing in the present times – terrorism, he said that public opinion world over should be built to isolate nations which shelter terrorists.