Editor-in-chief of Network 18 Group Rahul Joshi, guests from India and abroad, friends from media present here, ladies and gentlemen,
First of all, I express my gratitude to all of you for giving me this opportunity to participate in the Rising India Summit.
Friends, when we say: rising, the first feeling that we get is about going toward light from darkness. It’s a feeling of going toward a better future, feeling of moving ahead from our current or existing situation.
When we say ‘rise’ or ‘rising’ in the context of a country its connotation becomes comprehensive. What is this ‘Rising India’? Whether this ‘Rising India’ is just the strengthening of the economy or is it the Sensex being at a record high or is it the Forex reserves being at a record high or is it the coming of a record foreign investment in to the country?
Friends, for me Rising India means the rise of self respect of 1.25 billion people of the country, it is the rise of the self-esteem of the country. And when the will power, the resolves of these 1.25 billion people unite the impossible becomes possible, the extremely difficult task becomes achievable.
Today, this collective will power is realising the solemn pledge for making a New India.
Brothers and sisters, in several countries this has been the concept that the government should lead the development, it should lead the change and citizens should follow that. However, in the last four years we have reversed this situation in India. Now the citizen of the country leads and the government follows him. You yourself have noticed how in such a short span of time Clean India Mission has become a people’s movement. Media too has played the role of a partner in this thing.
The citizens of the country have made the digital payment a strong weapon for themselves in the fight against black money and corruption. Today, India is one of the fastest growing markets for digital payments.
The way people’s support is being extended to the government’s every action against the corruption that also is a testimony of the fact how determined the people have become to rid the country from its internal vices.
No matter what our political opponents say but because of this inspiration from the people of the country, the government could take big decisions and succeeded in implementing them. The recommendations for those decisions which were made decades ago, the laws which had been passed decades ago but were not implemented due to pressure from the corrupt regime, these laws and decisions too have been implemented by this government. And now on the basis of these laws the action has been taken at a large scale.
Friends, the transformational shift that is coming to India, it is coming because of its citizens, it is coming because of their will power. The same will power has been reducing the feeling of imbalance among the people, it has been reducing the feeling of imbalance among the different regions of the country.
Brothers and sisters, be it the rise of the country or of a society or of an individual, if there is no feeling of equality neither the society will succeed nor will the resolutions be realised. Therefore, if we look at it as a vision that our government has constantly been trying to remove this feeling of imbalance at national level. And I would like to explain its results to the viewers of Network 18 through a video.
Friends, Ujjwala has not been just changing the face of kitchens, but it has also been changing the face of millions and millions of families. It has been correcting a big imbalance in our social system.
Friends, the whole day today, I was there in Manipur before coming to your place. Several schemes have been launched there which are important for North-East, including the inauguration of a Science Congress, and the foundation laying ceremony of a Sports University. As a Prime Minister it was my 28th or 29th visit of the North-East.
You see, why is it so? Why is there so much focus of our government on Eastern India and North East? And those people who think that we have been doing this for getting votes they are not only far removed from the ground realities of the country but are also far removed from the hearts of the people.
Friends, emotional integration of eastern India and giving consideration to the demographic dividend is extremely important.
That is why our government has been following the formula of: Act East and Act fast for India’s East. And when I say: Act East then its connotation isnot just confined to the north-eastern states but it also includes eastern Uttar Pradesh, Bihar, West Bengal and Odisha.
This is that region of the country which has been left behind in the country’s developmental journey. A big reason behind this was the indifference towards the development of this region. Hundreds of projects in this region have either never been started or they have been stuck for decades. Our government has started the work of removing this imbalance by restarting the projects that have either been incomplete or have been stuck.
You would be surprised to know that an important gas cracker project in Assam had been stuck for the last 31 years. After formation of our government, we have again started the work on this project.
Today, the work for opening the fertiliser plants located in Gorakhpur in Uttar Pradesh, Barauni in Bihar and Sindari in Jharkhand, which have been non-operational for several years has been done at a very fast speed.
These plants will receive gas from the pipeline that is being laid between Jagdishpur to Haldia. This pipeline will develop an entire ecosystem based on gas pipelines in the important cities of Eastern India.
This was due to the efforts made by our government that the work on Paradip Oil Refinery in Odisha was speeded up and now Paradip is moving forward to become an island of development. Also, it is due to the effort made by our government that the work on the strategically extremely important Dhola-Sadiabridge connecting Assam and Arunachal has been speedily completed.
The infrastructure in the eastern India has constantly been strengthened in every possible direction be it road or railway sector. The government has been working to develop the waterways. The development of a waterway between Varanasi and Haldia will play a major role in transforming the industrial transportation of this place.
A dozen new airports are being constructed in the Eastern India under the Udaan scheme to improve the connectivity. Six out of these airports are being constructed in the North-East. You should be aware that the first commercial flight has landed in Sikkim a few days ago.
When the issue of new All India Institutes of Medical Sciences, the issue of newIndian Agricultural Research Institutes came up our government accorded priority to the Eastern India.
Also, the establishment of a central university in Motihari in Eastern Champaran, the work place of Mahatma Gandhi, was done by this government.
Friends, millions of new job opportunities have been created in these regions because of the schemes launched by the government.
Moving away from the concept that ‘Delhi is far away’, we have taken Delhi to the doorsteps of Eastern India. We have been including every region on the country in the mainstream of development by following the formula of SabkaSath-SabkaVikas.
Friends, I would like to show you a map. This map is a proof how a big imbalance has been addressed in the entire country in the last four years and the villages of Eastern India have been illuminated.
I often saythat there were 18,000 such villages in the country where there was no electricity even so many years after the independence. You would be surprised to know that 13,000 out of these villages were located in Eastern India. And 5,000 out of these 13,000 villages were in the North-East. Now the work to supply electricity to these villages is about to be completed.
Now our government has started Saubhagya Scheme to supply electricity to households. The government is going to spend more than Rs. 16,000 crore for this.
The light that has come into the lives of the people of Eastern India, this path, the path of - from Isolation to Integration - will further brighten Rising India.
Friends, there is a saying in the corporate world: you can’t manage what you can’t measure. Not only have we adopted this formula in our work culture but we have also taken it even further – ‘measure to manage, and manage to create mass movement’.
When a mass movement is being created, and when the public and government participate in a comprehensive manner it produces long-lasting and better results. I would like to give you the example of the health sector of the country.
We have been taking forward the health sector in a multisectoral manner by focusing on its four pillars.
Preventive Healthcare,
Affordable Healthcare,
Supply-side interventions,
Mission-mode intervention,
We have simultaneously focused on these four sectors. If there is only one ministry for health care in the country – the Health Ministry – and if it continues work alone then only silos are created and no solutions can be obtained due to this approach. Our effort has been: No Silos, Only Solutions.
In this people oriented movement we have included other ministries related to these issues like Cleanliness Ministry, Ayush Ministry, the Ministry of Chemicals and Fertilisers, the Ministry of Consumer Affairs and the Ministry of Women and Child Development in addition to the Health Ministry. So in this manner we have tried to move forward towards our predefined goal by taking everyone along.
If I talk about the first pillar – Preventive Health then it is the most affordable and also the easiest one.
We know that clean water is the first requirement for a healthy life. And we have activated the Ministry of Drinking Water and Sanitation by stressing upon this. Now see the result, there were toilets in 6.5 crore households in the entire country till 2014 but now there are toilets in 13 crore households, it means a growth of 100%.
Today, the sanitation coverage has gone up to 80% from 38% earlier. This is also a growth of more than 100%. This message that lack of cleanliness brings diseases with itself whereas cleanliness wards them off has also percolated to every household.
Yoga has reestablished its identity once again as a medium for preventive health care. Yoga has become a mass movement throughout the world because the Ministry of Ayush got activated.
We have brought in the concept of wellness centre in this year’s budget. The government’s effort is to establish a wellness centre in every major village Panchayat of the country.
We have laid special emphasis on immunisation programme. Before the formation of our government the growth rate of vaccination in the country was just one per cent, today it has gone up to 6.7%.
Friends, it is also necessary to have an affordable health care in addition to preventive health care. Health care should be accessible and should also be affordable and we have taken several steps to make it accessible and affordable for the common man.
We have activated the Ministry of Chemicals and Fertilisers that has been working in this direction. More than 3,000 Jan Aushadhi stores have been opened across the country where more than 800 medicines have been made available at affordable prices.
We have activated the Ministry of Consumer Affairs so that heart patients can get the stents at an affordable price and the ministry made special efforts for this thing and as a result, today, the price of a heart stent has come down by up to 85%. In addition to this, the cost of knee implants has also been regulated and because of that its cost has come down by 50 to 70%.
In this budget, we have announced another major scheme and that is Ayushman Bharat. The poorest of the poor people of the country are going to get a big relief through the Ayushman Bharat scheme. Nearly 10 crore families, it means nearly 45-50 crore citizens will be free from the concerns for the cost of treatment. If anybody falls sick, the expenses up to Rs. 5 lakh in a year will be colletively borne by the Government of India and the insurance company.
Friends, the third big pillar of the health sector is supply side intervention. Our government has constantly been trying to ensure the other essential services linked to healthcare sector.
Our government has increased the number of medical seats to solve the problem of shortage of doctors in the country, particularly in the rural areas.
Friends, when our government had assumed power in 2014 there were 52,000 undergraduate and 30,000 post graduate medical seats in the country. Today, there are more than 85,000 undergraduate and more than 46,000 post graduate seats in the country.
In addition to this, new AIIMS and Ayurved Science Institutes are being set up across the country. Moreover, it has been planned to establish one medical college in every three parliamentary constituencies.
These efforts will directly benefit the poor in addition to helping the youth of this country. The work to strengthen the human resource in the fields of paramedical and nursing has also been done. If the number of medical professionals increases the affordability and access to medical care also increases.
Brothers and sisters, mission mode intervention is the fourth and a very important pillar of the health sector.
There are some challenges which will require working in the mission mode. And only then will it help tackle those challenges and its results will be visible.
We have activated the Ministry of Women and Child Development so that the health of mothers and children is improved and they become free from diseases and become healthy and strong.
Appropriate nutrition for mother and child has been insured under the PradhanmantriSurakshitMatritvaAbhiyan and PradhanmantriMatriVandana Yojana.
National Nutritional Campaign has been launched last week on the occasion of International Women’s Day. This is the latest and a big step in the direction of making the country healthy. When mothers and children get proper nutrition their healthy life is also assured. Our government is trying to ensure that an unique development model is developed for every sector.
Friends, I would like to join you with the happiness of the entire country through a video.
The happiness that you have seen on the faces of those people, for me it is the Rising India.
How has this change come about?
You would recall that the country often remained without electricity in July six years ago due to failure of a power grid. What had happened was a breakdown of a system, it was a breakdown of the system of governance.
This was the level of silos in the governance that at one point of time the Ministry of Power did not know the road map of the Ministry of Coal. The Ministry of New and Renewable Energy did not have any coordination with the Ministry of Power.
The work of finding solutions by breaking down the silos has been done in a very comprehensive manner in the power sector of the country.
Today, the Ministry of Power, the Ministry of Renewable Energy and the Ministry of Coal have been working as one unit for finding out the best solutions for ensuring the energy security of India.
If coal is used for our energy security today the renewable energy can provide us sustainable energy for making a better future for our future generations. And this is the reason that we have been moving from the state of power shortage towards the state of being power surplus, from the state of network failure to the state of being a net exporter. The dream of One Nation-One Grid has also been realised due to the efforts made by the government.
Friends, the atmosphere of defeat, the atmosphere of despair and hopelessness can never take any country forward. You too have seen that in the last four years how the people of the country have developed a sense of confidence in the system of governance of the country. The kind of changes that people have before them, that people witness during their life time have given this confidence to every Indian that the India of 21st century can move forward by leaving behind its weaknesses, that the India of 21st century can move forward by breaking down its shackles and it can realise the dream of Ek Bharat-Shreshtha Bharat. And this strong belief of people is the basis for a Rising India.
Brothers and sisters, this is the reason that today the entire world is giving respect to this Rising India, giving respect to this rise of India. A comparison between the number of heads of state and heads of government who had visited India during the tenure of the last 10 years of the previous government and the number of heads of state and heads of government who have visited India during the last four years speaks volumes in itself. Today, the number of heads of state and heads of government who come to India in a year has almost doubled in comparison with the average number of heads of state and heads of government who used to come to India during the tenure of previous government.This is such an image of a Rising India that all of you will be proud of.
Friends, India has not only given a new direction to its own development but also given a new direction to the development of the entire world. Today, India is leading the solar revolution in the entire world. You have seen that how the event related to International Solar Alliance was successfully organised five days ago. More than 60 countries have agreed to implement Delhi Solar Agenda which was launched in this conference. In the 21st century, this effort by India on an issue like climate change is one of the greatest services to the entire mankind.
Friends, the way India’s influence on the world has increased in the last four years, continuous work has been done to achieve that as per a well laid out strategy. India has conveyed to the world the message of peace, development and of sustainable development.
Be it the United Nations or G-20, India has raised those issues at the top fora that affect the entire world. India is the country which has established this fact at international forums that terrorism is not a problem for just one country or one region but it is a problem for every single country in the world.
How the flow of black money and corruption in different countries impedes the development of the world and how it remains a challenge for effective financial governance, this topic was also raised by India in a forceful manner.
Friends, this is only because of India’s self-confidence that we have resolved to completely eradicate TB by 2025, five years before the deadline of 2030 which the entire world is trying to meet. I’m confident that India will be able to demonstrate this to the entire world by achieving this goal by 2025.
Brothers and sisters, today, Rising India is not just two words for the world. These two words symbolises the power of 1.25 billion Indians which has been applauded by the entire world today. And this is the reason that India has started getting membership of those institutions for which it has been trying for several years.
After joining the Missile Technology Control Regime, India has also joined WASENAR Arrangement and Australia group. India won elections for International Tribunal for the Law of the Sea, for International Maritime Organization and for United Nations Economic and Social Council. The way India won the election for International Court of Justice was discussed all over the world.
Friends, this is the impact of India’s growing influence that when there was a crisis in Yamen and India was safely getting out its citizens from the country then several other countries also appealed to India. You would be proud to hear that India safely rescued the people of 48 countries during that crisis.
Our policy of giving the maximum importance to human values in diplomacy has made the world realise that India has not only been working for its interests but it has also been working for the interest of the entire world. Our formula of SabkaSath-SabkaVikas has not been confined within the borders of the country.
Today, we have not only been working for Ayushman Bharat but we have also been working for Ayshman World. The awareness about the Yoga and Ayurved that has been generated across the world is also a reflection of Rising India.
Friends, now talking about the economy, in the last three-four years India has strengthened the world economy in addition to its own. The country now contributes more than 7% to the growth of world economy.
India has been performing well in all the macro-economic parameters be it inflation or current account deficit or fiscal deficit or GDP growth or interest rate or FDI inflow.
Today, whatever discussion takes place in the world regarding India it takes place with hope and confidence, it takes place with full confidence. And precisely this is the reason that a lot of rating agencies of the world have been upgrading India’s rating.
Today, India also figures among the top three prospective host economies of the world.
India has been rated as top two emerging market performers in the FDI Confidence Index.
India has been described as one of the most favorite FDI destinations in the world in UNCTAD’s World Investment Report.
We have risen by 42 places in the World Bank’s Ease of Doing Business ranking in just three years.
India has achieved a growth rate of 7.2% in the third quarter of FY 2017-18. Economic experts are of the view that this growth rate will increase further.
Friends, before 2014, India’s tax system was known as unfriendly, unpredictable and non-transparent for investors. Now this situation is being changed. GST has established India as one of the largest economic markets in the world.
Friends, the government has been working with a holistic approach by understanding the aspirations of the poor people, of the lower middle class and middle class people.
We have announced the launch of a new scheme under the name of RISE - Revitalising Infrastructure and Systems in Education - in this budget. Our government is going to spend more than one lakh crore rupees in the next four years to improve the education system of the country under this scheme.
The government has also been working to set up 20 world class Institutes of Eminence in the country. We have been working in association with private and public sector institutes in the field of higher education. Also, a financial grant of Rs. 10,000 crore will be given to 10 select institutes in the public sector under this mission.
Similarly, we have been running the programmes like Stand-up India, Start-up India, Skill India Mission to encourage the self-employment among the Indian youths, particularly to encourage the entrepreneurs working in the MSME sector.
Particularly, the Pradhanmantri Mudra Scheme has been acting as a strong medium for the empowerment of youth and women. Our government has approved more than 11 crore loans so far since the start of this scheme. Loans worth more than Rs. 5 lakh crore have been disbursed to the borrowers without any bank guarantee. We have decided to grant the loans worth Rs. 3 lakh crore under Mudra scheme in this year’s budget.
If we look at all these efforts as a bouquet of flowers these things have provided as the basis for fulfilling the aspirations of middle class and urban youth and also for creating new employment opportunities.
I’m hopeful that an individual or a region which has been left behind in the mainstream of development but when he grows at a fast speed and when justice is being done with his capabilities and resources the story of a Rising India will get further momentum.
In the end, I would like to once again remind you about the year 2022, and about the journey of achieving targets through resolutions. Has the media resolved something new? Have you prepared a roadmap? Have you thought about what you should do that will help realising the dream of a New India by 2022?
I would be happy if you, my friends from the media accept some challenge and promote your resolutions on your channels and then telecastthe follow up.
Friends, in a way, 1.25 billion countrymen are like gods. And every single institution, every single unit of the country needs to work for the welfare of the country, for nation building and for taking forward this journey of development in a resolute manner.
Whatever resolutions you people have, I convey my best wishes to you for those.
Once again thank you very much to all of you.
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