Chennai, (Samajweekly) Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Saturday said the government’s work culture, vision, speed and scale has resulted in a revolution in the infrastructure projects in the country.
Without naming the earlier Congress governments, Modi said from the days of delays, now the infrastructure projects are being delivered even before time, and added that Tamil Nadu had got a good number of core sector projects.
Inaugurating and laying the foundation stone for several infrastructure projects – airport, rail and road projects – worth about Rs 5,200 crore here, Modi said the country is witnessing a revolution in infrastructure projects driven by speed and scale.
Pointing to Rs 10 lakh crore allocation in the budget for infrastructure projects, Modi said it was five times more than what was allocated in 2014.
He said prior to 2014 only 600 route railway kilometres per year were electrified and now it is 4,000 route kms per annum. In the case of airport, before 2014 there were only 74 airports and after that year – after BJP came to power at the Centre under his stewardship – the number has more than doubled to 150.
Modi said the speed and scale is not only restricted to delivery of core sector projects but also in social sector works and said the number of medical colleges in the country has gone up to 660 from 380 in 2014 and the number of AIIMS hospitals has tripled.
He said six lakh km of optic fibre cables have been laid to connect two lakh village panchayats resulting in rural India having more Internet users than urban India.
Adding further, Modi said his government sees infrastructure projects not merely a mixture of concrete but having human face – as it would give the economy a boost and uplift several families.
Stating that the development of Tamil Nadu is a great priority for his government, Modi added that the state got an allocation of Rs 6,000 crore for railway projects this year while the average amount allocated between 2009-2014 was less than Rs 900 crore per annum.
Similarly, between 2004-2014 the state had a National Highway of 800 km while post 2014, the length has gone up to nearly 2,000 km, Modi added.
He also said the allocation for National Highway projects in Tamil Nadu has gone up six times to Rs 8,200 crore in 2022-23 as compared to 2014-15.
Continuing further, Modi said Tamil Nadu has seen several new infrastructure projects like the Defence Industrial Corridor, Mega Textile Park, Chennai-Bangalore Expressway and others furthering the state’s economic growth.
Referring to the Vande Bharat train that was designed, developed and built by the Integral Coach Factory (ICF) here, Modi said Made-in-India is ingrained in the state which is the land of freedom fighter V.O. Chidambaram Pillai.
Before the country got Independence, the late Pillai ran the first Swadeshi shipping service against the Britishers who were then ruling the country.
Earlier speaking at the function, Tamil Nadu Chief Minister M.K. Stalin urged the central government to speed up the ongoing – road and rail- projects.
Union Civil Aviation Minister Jyotiraditya M Scindia said more airports will be built in the coming years.
Tamil Nadu Governor R.N. Ravi, Union Railway Minister Ashwini Vaishnaw, Union Minister of State for Fisheries, Animal Husbandry and Dairying and Information and Broadcasting L. Murugan and others participated in the event.
