It is my absolute honour to invite you all to Indus International School Pune’s first intraschool Model United Nations, IISPMUN. Our team has been working tirelessly to make this flagship conference a great success.

The IISPMUN begins with the goal of young minds coming together and discussing issues pertinent to the world order. We strive to leave a legacy for generations of students; a legacy of crafting the thinkers of today, and building the leaders of tomorrow. I know that our duty is of the utmost importance, and the theme ‘Seizing the Future’ perfectly encapsulates these values at IISPMUN.

The committees have been tailored to the theme and the needs of our delegates: UNGA, UNSC, DISEC, ECOSOC, UNHRC, and UNFCCC are all centered on global issues that IISP focuses on. I welcome you to the IISPMUN with honour.

I firmly believe that the pursuit of hope is an essential element of every human life and is vital for a future of growth, goodness, and healing. In a world marred by evil, where discrimination, oppression, and self-interest are rampant, keeping hope is crucial. It is only unending and undying hope that can fuel the passion and will towards change. Without it, we are purposeless and lost, tarrying on in a world not worth its lives.

This year's theme, "Seizing the Future!", was chosen to represent this pursuit towards opportunity. The IISP MUN 2022 agendas look onward at solutions and pathways towards a brighter future by fighting some of the most pivotal challenges presented to us in the 21st Century.

I look forward to thought-provoking discussions that propagate this hope into the realms of politics and socioeconomics.

A consequence of our connected and chaotic world is that there has been a sharp increase in suffering.  Maybe that suffering has always existed, but now, we cannot turn away from it.  It is everywhere - our news, our books, around us - and it is unending.

It is easy to be overwhelmed.  There is a reason why we have to spend energy protecting ourselves from the uncertainty of the world - we are not made for a cruel planet.  No matter what anyone says, I believe we are good people created for a soft Earth. What do we do then, when we can't see the light?  "Do not be daunted by the enormity of the world's grief," the Talmud said.  "You are not obligated to complete the work, but neither are you free to abandon it." 

I hope that this is the lesson you take away from the IISP MUN 2022 - that even though there is a lot of suffering in the world to resolve, our responsibility is to fix what we can, if only a little bit.  We cannot do it all, but that does not mean we shouldn't try.

The nature of the human experience is that it's uncertain. It's a little bit ironic to say it, but really, the only thing we can be certain about, is that there will always be uncertainty. There will always be unforeseeable factors - surprise tests, unimaginable betrayals, twists and turns and tumbles on the road of life.

In such a volatile life, it's natural to want some semblance of control, to feel one hundred percent in charge of something. As students, this isn't always the case. But it doesn't hurt to dream.

In the IISP MUN, it is my hope that you will be able to find your way through this uncertainty - even in a world where everything seems to be on a larger level, some things are up to us alone. And its our responsibility to step up.

Time can be so many things - a resource, a force, a currency. I think time is an image, brought to life by the choices we make.

Choices are the forces that drive us and what makes us who we are. While being our greatest strength, they are also our greatest weakness, and can transform the trajectory of our lives. Time travellers can change the present by the smallest of alterations to the past - we can change the future by the smallest alterations to the present.

With the IISP MUN 2022, I hope you learn that this is what seizing the future means - making better choices. Our present is what our past made it, and our future is what we make of it in the present.