Addressing a rally in poll-bound Uttar Pradesh's Varanasi, his lok Sabha constituency, Prime Minister Narendra Modi said on Monday, "We celebrated 'Chhoti Diwali' on September 29". He was talking while laying the foundation and inaugurating as many as seven big projects for his Parliamentary constituency, terming the same as ‘Saptrishi’, as they would be speed up the pace of development and guide the people making quality changes in their life.
Hinting about the recent surgical strikes across the loC he said, “I got feedback from the people that after the September 29 incident, the people in this ancient city had celebrated 'Chhoti Diwali.'
He appealed to all to boost the morale of the Army and paramilitary personnel on the eve of Diwali by giving missed calls on 1922 and after downloading his ‘Apps’.
“It would boost the morale of our jawans that they are being supported by 125 crore Indians as it is due to their sacrifices and bravery, we would celebrate our Diwali in happy atmosphere along with family members,” he said. Talking about the work being done by the NDA, Modi said, “Earlier we had seen that while one Government laid the foundation stone of one project but it was inaugurated by second or third Government but I am happy that many of the projects which were started by me earlier have been inaugurated today,” he said after launching projects of nearly `5000 crores including laying the foundation stone for ambitious `1000-crore city gas system under Urga Ganga of Eastern India Project in which seven cities would be given CNG and PMG through the 2,540 km Jagdishpur -Haldia & Bokaro- Dhamra Natural Gas Pipeline Project and apart from Varanasi the other cities are Ranchi, Patna, Jamshedpur, Cuttack, Bhubneshwar and Kolkata.
Handing over the passbooks to seven family members under Sukanya Samridhi Yjna and lPG connections to five under Ujjawala Yojna apart from awarding two gram pradhans for remarkable response to the financial inclusion scheme, the PM said that all these are the examples that we want to develop such a work culture in the country where the projects should not only be advertised in newspapers but also to get completed in scheduled time. " It's the reason why whenever I approve any project I also ask the time when the same would be completed," he said.
Among the seven projects, he also unveiled the foundation stone through remote control for doubling the tracks and electrification on Varanasi-Allahabad route apart from Perishable Cargo Depot at Raja Talab railway station for vegetables storage. He also inaugurated the first phase of extension of production unit in DlW and laid the foundation of another phase of extension work under which dual and electric locomotives would be manufactured in the DlW, which has already started production of dual locomotives which can be run both through diesel and electricity.
According to the PM, without quality energy no smooth development is possible and expressed his happiness over dedicating 765/400 KV GIS power sub-station constructed by Powergrid. He also expressed his happiness over releasing a postal stamp on Kashi and making a zone of Postal department in Varanasi. "We've already given banking permissions to the Postal department as the department had more branches than all the banks combined as there are over 1.5 lakh branches of post-offices in the country.
`The function was also attended by the Governor Ram Naik,Minister of State (with Independent charge) for Petroleum and Natural Gas Dharmendra Pradhan, Minister of State for Railways and Communication (Independent Charge) Manoj Sinha, minister of state for Human Resources Development Dr Mahendra Nath Pandey, Minister of State for Health Anupriya Patel, while on behalf of state government minister for Khadi and Village Industries Brahma Shankar Tripathi , apart from state BJP chief Keshav Prasad Maurya, senior officers of Gail India, Powergrid, Indian Postal department, Railways and many others.