Union Ministers and a smattering of Bollywood actors, including megastar Amitabh Bachchan, on Saturday participated in a gala event, held at historic India Gate in Delhi, aimed at publicising the achievements of the Narendra Modi Government on the completion of two years in office. The five-hour programme “Ek Nayi Subah” was telecast live by Doordarshan across the country.
Modi, who delivered the concluding speech at the event, reiterated his Government’s commitment to fulfill promise to the people of India and vowed to root out corruption and make life easier for people “looted” for years. Opening a broadside against corruption, the PM said, “This Government is answerable to the people of the country. The money, the nation has, belongs to the poor and the poor must get the fruits of development. But those who were earlier looting the nation are not enthused by this Government.”
Criticising the obscurantist politics of the Opposition, Modi said, “We saw two things over the last few days; on one side there is vikasvad (development agenda) and other side is virodhvad (obscurantism). In a democracy, it is vital to analyse everyone’s work.
But we can’t make a mistake of creating a false atmosphere of despondency. The NDA Government’s work must be evaluated against the work of previous Government.”
Modi thanked the people for the confidence shown in his leadership. “I have seen in the last 15 days, every aspects of the NDA Government’s work are scrutinised in minute details. We have acquired new confidence of public and it has raised our enthusiasm to work with more vigour,” he said.
The event started with young Ministers like Kiren Rijiju, Rajyavardhan Singh Rathore and Babul Supriyo talking about “new vision, new India” as they heaped praise on the Prime Minister for his vision and making efforts for effective execution of various programmes. Bollywood actor R Madhavan and anchor Neelam Sharma hosted the programme which was also attended by Union Ministers Birender Singh, Maneka Gandhi, Najma Heptulla, Ram Vilas Paswan, Uma Bharti, Harsimrat Kaur Badal and JP Nadda.
Bollywood megastar Amitabh Bachchan said, “It’s time we realise that half of the country’s population can’t be left behind by making them feel neglected and helpless. They should be equal partners in the country’s development.”
Finance Minister Arun Jaitley said, “At a time when the global economies are shrinking, our economy is growing around 7.5 per cent. This is a healthy growth rate, especially in the context of current global economic scenario.”
Union Minister Uma Bharti said the Ganga, considered one of the 10 most polluted rivers in the world, will become one of the cleanest by 2018. She said the Government is seriously working for Ganga rejuvenation and what could not be achieved in the past 29 years after spending Rs4,000 crore, was taking place now.
Union Rural Development Minister Birender Singh spoke on the need to change the mindset of the people on the issue of sanitation. Singh also said of 60 lakh toilets planned, far more have been constructed across India. Union Minister of State for Finance Jayant Sinha said the Government is working overtime to strengthen rural infrastructure which will lead to a “revolution”.
Maneka Gandhi, Union Women and Child Development Minister, said the Government has strengthened Anganwadi centres to tackle malnutrition and taken several child reform initiatives to ensure their safety and security.
listing out Government’s achievements in the past two years, Gandhi said the Women and Child Development Ministry has streamlined adoption and foster care procedures which has helped in cracking down on illegal child care institutions.
Talking about children’s immunisation cover, Health Minister JP Nadda said, “We launched Mission Indradhanush, which was apart from routine immunisation programme, to provide seven types of vaccines to the left out children. In three phases, we covered 497 districts where immunisation was below 50 per cent and, within one year, 1.62 crore children were immunised out of whom 45 lakh were fully immunised and rest partially. With this, immunisation increased five to seven per cent in one year.”
(With Inputs from agencies)