Ahmedabad: The ten years of the Narendra Modi government have seen people shedding pessimism and becoming optimistic about the country’s future, Bharatiya Janata Party president J P Nadda said here on Tuesday.
The government has taken steps to bring about reforms in every sector, he said while speaking at a joint program of the Ahmedabad Medical Association and the BJP’s Doctors Cell here.
“This is a decade of transformation. There can be many ways of looking at it. Till ten years ago, there was a way of thinking that nothing is going to change and no difference will be made whoever comes to power….Today the people’s mindset has changed and they believe that things can change, they are changing and will change,” Nadda said.
“We can see a changing atmosphere. We are full of optimism, as against pessimism ten years ago,” he added.
Modi changed the definition of vote bank politics, and while others talked about OBCs and other caste groups, he said there are only four castes, the poor, youth, farmers and women, the BJP chief said.
Before 2014, India was considered to be a corrupt country where nobody wanted to invest, he said, adding that this image has changed and from the 11th largest economy ten years ago, India has become the fifth largest economy and is on course to become the third largest by 2028.
“We were considered to be (among the) fragile five, and today we are the fifth largest economy. We were considered to be a black spot, today we are the only bright spot,” the BJP chief said.
The prime minister gave dignity to women by constructing 16 crore toilets and got passed the women’s quota bill which was an example of transformative thinking, Nadda said.
The armed forces were ill-equipped before Modi took over and corruption was rampant in defence procurement, but now India has enhanced its fighting capacity and become a “bulletproof jacket exporting country,” he said.
The Atal tunnel is helping the Army in Ladakh get its supplies in time during winter, Nadda said while talking about the infrastructure push of the government.
The Modi government has also reformed medical education and increased medical facilities through various schemes such as Ayushman Bharat and Jan Aushadhi, he said.
The National Eligibility-cum-Entrance Test for medical education is now held in 16 Indian languages, Nadda noted.
Lord Ram was seated in his temple in Ayodhya after “an exile of 500 years”, he said, referring to Monday’s consecration ceremony.
“We had heard of 14 years of vanvaas (exile) of Lord Ram. But we have seen that he also went through 500 years of vanvas. Yesterday, after the consecration ceremony by Prime Minister Modi, he was seated in his temple,” the BJP chief said.
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