Defence Minister Rajnath Singh on Wednesday claimed that the country’s military exports rose by more than 20 years in the last five years, which was proof of India’s “self-reliance” under Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s leadership.
Addressing a gathering of local intelligentsia in north Bihar’s Sitamarhi town, Singh said defence exports were worth “about Rs 1,000 crore, when I took over, and it has soared to worth over Rs 20 lakh crore”.
“Our total defence manufacture stands at a monumental one lakh crore. Try figuring it out by scribbling the number, in digits, on a piece of paper. This shows India is becoming self-reliant (atma nirbhar) and leaders across the world acknowledge that 21st century shall belong to India”, said the Defence minister, who was on a day-long trip of Bihar.
The former BJP president asserted that his party was characterised by “no difference between words and deeds”, and disclosed “I had been entrusted with preparing the manifesto for elections in 2014 and again five years later. On both occasions, Narendra Modi had insisted that we do not make any promise that we could not fulfil”.
Singh said abrogation of Article 370, scrapping of triple talaq and construction of Ram temple at Ayodhya showed “we always walk the talk (Jo kahte hain Kar ke dikhate hain)”.
Going down the memory lane, he recalled having gone to jail at the height of the Ayodhya movement in 1990s “when I headed the BJP’s youth wing”.
The Union minister also highlighted “India’s jump from the 11th spot to the fifth” in terms of the size of the economy and expressed conference “We will be among the top three in the world soon and by 2047 we shall be a developed economy”.
He also credited the prime minister’s intervention for the recent release from Qatar of former Indian Navy officials whom a court in the West Asian country had awarded death sentence.
He also recalled Russia and Ukraine “halting their war for a few hours, upon Modi’s request, to facilitate return of our students” a year ago.
“In contrast, governments formed by the Congress in the past were known for empty promises of eradicating poverty and corruption scandals that saw even Union ministers landing in jail”, said the senior BJP leader.
Singh, who is on a day-long tour of Bihar, had earlier paid obeisance at the nearby Punaura Dham, a shrine situated at the spot where Goddess Sita is believed to have been discovered by King Janaka.
“The way Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s credibility has been rising, there will be no area left where the lotus would not bloom”, Singh had told reporters on the occasion.
He was also asked whether the lotus would bloom “for the first time” in Sitamarhi, a Lok Sabha seat the BJP has never seen. He replied “With the blessings of Mother Janaki, the lotus would bloom in Sitamarhi, too”, but hastened to add, with a ghost of smile on his lips, saying “there is a pond nearby with lots of lotuses. So there is no problem”.
Notably, the party has not fielded its own candidate in Sitamarhi after the 1998 Lok Sabha polls, leaving it for allies like Chief Minister Nitish Kumar’s JD(U) or, in 2014 when he fought separately, for the now defunct RLSP.
The JD(U) had won the seat in 2019, when it fielded Sunil Kumar Pintu, a BJP man who chipped in after the official candidate of the Chief Minister’s party returned his ticket.
It is being understood that the JD(U) wants to contest the seat again and Nitish Kumar, who is now the party president, has assured state legislative council Chairman Devesh Chandra Thakur that he will be the candidate this time.
This has met with resentment from Pintu while the BJP has been maintaining a studied silence over the issue.
The Union minister declined to take questions on development of Sitamarhi, which is not a patch on Ayodhya in terms of infrastructure, despite being a part of the “Ramayana Circuit”.
