The Bharatiya Janata Party government yesterday celebrated two years in power with a large-scale event to showcase its achievements and sketch out a future roadmap.
Top cabinet ministers, some of the country’s biggest film stars and scores of people attended the “Ek Nayi Subah” (A New Dawn) show held near the India Gate monument in central Delhi.
The five-hour-long event was shown on Doordarshan television and included talk shows on the government’s achievements.
Coverage was interspersed with cultural performances featuring singing and dancing.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi attended towards the end of the event.
Finance Minister Arun Jaitley, a key Modi aide, who participated in panel discussions, said India had emerged as the fastest growing major economy despite a global slowdown and could grow between 8 and 9% in the years to come.
Bollywood icon Amitabh Bachchan spoke on social issues including girls’ education and fighting the culture of female foeticide, the selective abortion of baby girls.
The 73-year-old actor later spoke to schoolgirls from various schools.
Water Resources Minister Uma Bharati said the government was following a phased approach to clean up the Ganges,
regarded Hinduism’s holiest river.
“Today Ganga is among the 10 dirtiest rivers in the world. By 2018, it will be among the 10 cleanest rivers,” she said, according to NDTV.
Other ministers emphasised the promotion of the Clean India drive, a campaign to promote cleanliness and better sanitation in the country.
The Bharatiya Janata Party took power on May 26, 2014, after a landslide victory on promises of boosting economic growth, curbing corruption and creating jobs.
Modi and his ministers have been addressing public meetings and press conferences across the country since the government’s second anniversary on Thursday.
The main opposition Congress Party released a “report card” on the failures of the Modi government in the last two years.
Congress leader Palaniappan Chidambaram questioned the government’s performance, saying it had not been able to help in key areas like job creation, relieving India’s agrarian crisis or providing relief in drought-hit areas in the country.
“Where are the jobs? The most notable failure of the government has been in job creation,” the Congress leader said.
“The ferment in universities can be partly attributed to the bleak future faced by university graduates. Besides, there are millions of young people who will complete no more than 8 or 10 years of school education and will have no special skills. Where are the jobs for them,” Chidambaram asked.
Also yesterday, Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal said Modi was controlling a large chunk of media, while reacting to a tweet that said no mainstream media has covered Rana Ayyub’s book Gujarat Files: Anatomy of a Cover Up.
“What does that tell us? It tells us that Modi controls a large chunk of media, especially the owners,” Kejriwal wrote on Twitter.
Journalist Rana Ayyub met bureaucrats and top officials in Gujarat who held key positions in the state between 2001 and 2010 and brings to light the involvement of the state and its officials during the Gujarat riots in new book. The book investigates the alleged fake encounters that happened under Modi’s watch as the then chief minister of Gujarat between 2001 and 2010.