FACES OF FREEDOM: Adish Jain

During the past two weeks, Times-Dispatch newsroom staff members asked people in the Richmond region, "What does freedom mean to you?"

We'll run their photos and answers in Saturday's Times-Dispatch as part of our special Fourth of July weekend coverage. For Adish Jain, the foundation of freedom is the rule of law and equal treatment under the law.

"The law and order is very strong here," said Jain, who grew up in India and came to the United States in 1978. "Law and order is the main reason that people feel secure."

Jain, 55, was educated as an engineer in India but moved to the United States for better job opportunities. "It is a land of opportunity," he said.

He has raised a family in Henrico County, and in 1997 he opened his own technology-consulting business.

"In other parts of the world where I have traveled, you don't find that freedom," he said, "because people are not safe, or people are struggling every day for a lot of simple, simple things that we have in this country." -- John Reid Blackwell