Prime minister’s reply on president’s address touches various issues like cleanliness and expenditure reduction
Prime minister Narendra Modi said on Friday that "if there is anything against farmers in land acquisition bill, the government is ready to change it".
Speaking on motion of thanks to the president's address to parliament, Modi said "lot of discussion is going on the land acquisition issue. When the Act was made, we walked shoulder to shoulder with you."
Taking a swipe at the opposition, the PM said, "we knew you were hurrying passage of the bill for political gains, yet we stood with you."
"In an era of co-operative federalism, can we become arrogant? Should we not listen to the chief ministers of the states," Modi asked.
Making it very clear about the vision of the administration he said “my government's only religion is 'India first', only religious book is Indian Constitution, only prayer is welfare of all.”
Some of the points touched by the prime minister during his speech in the Lok Sabha:
- Hindus and Muslims should not fight against each other but against poverty.
- Cleanliness is a major issue, it is about our mindset, It's our responsibility to ensure cleanliness.
- When I speak of swachhata abhiyaan, I keep in mind the poor who fall sick due to dirty or unhygienic surroundings.
- Do we not have to integrate every Indian in swachhata abhiyaan?
- Governments have not made this country as great as it is. India is great because the people have made it so. Governments will come and go.
- Governments come and go. This great nation has been made by the People, their strength and their ability.
- We never claimed that we will do everything in 9 months.
- Corruption has ruined the Nation and the Nation must not discuss it through a political prism.
- Do not want corruption to be discussed within the limitations of politics. Because that limits us to whose shirt is whiter.
- I truly believe corruption free services can be developed. Everyone needs to work together to fight the malpractice of corruption.
- State must be policy driven. If a state is policy driven then grey areas are going to be minimum.
- One of our greatest achievements is that we have forced the nation to debate the issue of black money.
- We talk a lot about farmers, but shouldn't we also find concrete ways to address issues of farmers? "Per Drop, More Crop" is what we want to focus on.
- We believe in optimum utilisation of our infrastructure.
- We have formed an expenditure commission to reduce frivolous expenditure. We are moving towards good governance and best practices.
- I have never been able to understand why certificates needed to be attested. We have introduced a rule of self-attestation and verification against originals at the final stage. This may seem small to you, but it helps the common man, the unprivileged people of this country.
- Our government is not playing politics over the poor, and will stand by it.