Addressing the nation from the ramparts of the Red Fort on Independence Day, Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Tuesday said that India has emerged as a confident nation in the last 10 years, and now even at the international level, it is known as the voice of the Global South and a critical part of global supply chains.
Modi, with his eyes firmly focused on the slew of Assembly elections in the next few months as well as the 2024 Lok Sabha polls, said that he was giving a report card of the last 10 years under the shadow of the Tricolour.
“We have left behind an old school of thought and whatever projects I am inaugurating today were conceptualised in the last 10 years. We work on the principle of ‘Sarvajan Hitay Sarvajan Sukhay’. We have fulfilled all our targets, whether it is providing toilets to rural women, opening bank accounts for the poor, providing cheaper housing loans for urban poor, the fastest rollout of 5G, and even the building a new Parliament.
"This is a new and confident India, which never loses, tires or stops,” Modi said.
Today, he added, our frontiers are now more secure, as we are making our defence forces more battle ready and therefore we are working on defence sector reforms.
"Terror attacks are now a thing of the past, and such incidents have considerably come down."
The Prime Minister went on to say that "in 2014, we were placed 10th economy-wise, now we are the fifth largest economy due to people’s efforts".
"There was a time, when scams and corruption prevailed and India was counted among the Fragile Five. We strengthened the economy and focussed on poor’s welfare, and when nation is strong economically, then hearts are filled with confidence.
“Human sensibilities need to be at the centre of all solutions, and this is what the Covid-19 pandemic taught us. Today India is a confident nation, there are no ifs and buts in the hearts of our people. The ball is in our court, don’t let this opportunity go.
"We have the capability to understand situations and that’s why in 2014, people after 30 years decided to bring a stable and strong government, which brought to an end a period of political indecisiveness, instability and of weak governments,” Modi added.
"Hearts of people are connected with the thought of nation first, which is going to result in positive initiations. It is you who formed the governments in 2014 and 2019 and this is what gave Modi confidence to launch reforms and perform. With people’s participation, things are being transformed, reforms are launched and transformation is taking place. Reform, perform and transform is the new motto to take the nation forward.
“We formed the Jal Shakti Ministry, which is providing water to each and every household of the country. Holistic healthcare is today’s demand, we formed the Ayush Ministry. Fishing sector’s development is in our hearts, so we formed a separate ministry for it too.
To support and strengthen the cooperative sectors, we also formed the Cooperation Ministry,” he added.