Team Blitz India
PUNE: Prime Minister Narendra Modi was conferred the Lokmanya Tilak National Award in Pune on Tuesday, August 1. Saying that he felt honoured, he announced that he would donate his prize money of Rs 1 lakh to the Namami Gange project.
Paying tributes to Bal Gangadhar Tilak on his death anniversary, he called him “the ideal of all of us and the pride of India” and reminded, “today (August 1) is also the birth anniversary of Annabhau Sathe ji”.
Later, he inaugurated the completed section of the Pune Metro and handed over more than 1,280 houses constructed under the Pradhan Mantri Awas Yojana (PMAY) by the Pimpri Chinchwad Municipal Corporation (PCMC) and another 2,650 such accommodations constructed by the Pune Municipal Corporation.
The Prime Minister laid the foundation stone for around 1,190 PMAY houses to be constructed by the PCMC and over 6,400 houses constructed by Pune Metropolitan Region Development Authority.
He also inaugurated a Waste to Energy Plant developed at a cost of about Rs 300 crores. “Pune is a vibrant city that gives momentum to the economy of the country and fulfils the dreams of the youth of the entire country. Today’s projects with about 15 thousand crores will further strengthen this identity”, observed the Prime Minister.
He underlined the seriousness of the government about the quality of life of the urban middle class. Emphasising the need to improve public transport infrastructure, he pointed out that before 2014, the country had only 250 km of metro network and most of the metro lines were limited to Delhi.
The metro network was limited to only five cities, he observed, while now it is functional in 20 cities, including Pune, Nagpur, and Mumbai, where the network is being expanded.
Referring to India’s growing identity as the hub of innovation and startups, the Prime Minister informed that India has crossed 1 lakh startups compared to a few hundred nine years ago.
Concluding his address, he quoted a Marathi saying that it is the government’s endeavour to make not just a better today but an even better tomorrow as well.
