Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Monday asserted that the country will be the third-largest economy in the third term of the Bharatiya Janata Party-led NDA government.
During the Lok Sabha President’s address, PM Modi attacked the Congress by quoting P. Chidambaram, the Finance Minister at the time, who had presented the Interim Budget for 2014–15. Chidambaram stated that the party was proud to be the eleventh largest economy in 2014.
Emphasising that India will be the third largest economy in his third term, PM Modi quoted the then Finance Minister and said, “India was the 11th largest economy in 2014. Today, India is the 5th largest economy, and yet they (Congress) are silent… They saw a vision that India will be the third largest in 30 years. We will not allow the nation to wait for so long. It is Modi’s guarantee that in our third term, India will be the third largest economic power…”
“…On the basis of the experience of 10 years of governance, looking at today’s strong economy and the rapid speed with which India is progressing today, I can confidently say that in our third term, India will be the third largest economic power. This is Modi’s guarantee,” the PM added.
PM Modi also listed the achievements of his government in the last 10 years since 2014.
“We built 4 crore houses for the poor. For the urban poor, we built 80 lakh pucca houses. Had these been built at the speed of Congress…it would have taken 100 years to do this work. Five generations would have passed by then,” he said.
Listing the scrapping of the British-era penal codes, vision for developed India, the PM said, “Lord Ram has returned not only home, but to such a grand temple that it is definite that ‘Abki baar 400 paar’ (This time 400 plus). Even Kharge ji (Mallikarjun Kharge) is saying it. Not only will NDA win 400+ seats, BJP itself will win 300 seat”.
The Lok Sabha debated the motion of thanks regarding the President’s address, with about sixty speakers participating. The Budget Session will end on February 9 after starting on January 31. In his response to the debate on the motion of thanks to the President’s address, Modi also took aim at the opposition parties, specifically the Congress, stating that “every word of their speech, I and the country are now convinced that they have resolved to sit for a long time in the opposition.”
