Prime Minister Narendra Modi remarked on Saturday that although some people’s focus is cutting ribbons at inaugurations, “our priority is completing projects on schedule.” This was a subtle jab at the Samajwadi Party. The PM’s comments came in the wake of SP president Akhilesh Yadav’s declaration that the key works on the Saryu canal irrigation project were completed during his term in Uttar Pradesh, not under the present BJP administration.
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“The country has to pay 100 times more the price owing to the negligence of previous governments,” Modi remarked at a rally in poll-bound UP after inaugurating the Saryu canal project. The project will provide irrigation water to over 14,000 hectares of land and will support more than 29 million farmers, primarily in the Eastern UP region, of which over Rs 4,600 has been supported over the past four years. The canal project also entails the interconnection of five rivers, the Saryu, Banganga, Rohini, Ghaghara, and Rapti, and to guarantee the best possible use of the region’s water resources.
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Modi paid respect to Chief of Defence Staff General Bipin Rawat at the occasion, saying his death was a big loss to the country. The Prime Minister also wished Group Captain Varun Singh, a Deoria native, a fast recovery after the helicopter disaster in Tamil Nadu’s Coonoor on Wednesday, which killed 13 people, including General Rawat, his wife, and 11 armed forces soldiers. PM Modi also asked farmers from all around the country to watch a megaprogram on natural farming on December 16, claiming that it would be beneficial to them. The opening ceremony of the canal project was attended by Uttar Pradesh Governor Anandiben Patel, Supreme Minister Yogi Adityanath, Deputy Minister Keshav Prasad Maurya and Trade Union Minister Jal Shakti Gajendra Singh Shekhawat.
