Manas Dasgupta
NEW DELHI, Dec 22: The Prime Minister Narendra Modi has said his government was working on the premise that the country’s resources belong to all and every citizen should benefit from them without any discrimination of caste, creed and religion.
He was addressing the Centenary Celebrations of the Aligarh Muslim University (AMU) on Tuesday through video conference. He also released a postal stamp commemorating the event.
Possibly the current farmers’ agitation being uppermost in his mind, Modi without giving reference to any particular issue mildly chided the opposition for bringing in politics in his government’s way in implementing the developmental programmes. The vision of new India envisages that the development of the nation and society should not be seen from a political angle, he said and asked the people to be vigilant against misleading propaganda and keep the interest of the nation supreme in one’s heart.
“Politics can wait but society can not, similarly poor belonging to whichever section, can not wait. We can not waste time and should work together to create an Aatamnirbhar Bharat. For attainment of national goals, all differences must be set aside,” Modi insisted.
Taking advantage of the occasion to address the minority audience in the country, the prime minister enumerated the measures his government was taking for the benefits of the minorities in general and the Muslim girls in the particular. He referred to the “Tripple Talaq” act and said the country was looking forward to build a new and modern Muslim Society with the abolition of such unwanted practices. He also referred to the high drop-out rates among the Muslim girls from schools earlier which he said was more than 70 per cent only because most of the schools did not have separate toilets for girl students. Due to the efforts of his government to construct toilets under the “Swachha Bharat” mission, the drop-out rate had now come down to 30 per cent, he claimed. He also appreciated the “Bridge courses” being run for school drop-out students by the Aligarh Muslim University.
He said the government was very focused on the education of Muslim daughters and their empowerment. In the last 6 years, nearly one crore Muslim daughters have been given scholarships by the government. He further stressed that there should be no discrimination on the basis of gender, everyone should get equal rights, everyone should get the benefit of development of the country.
Modi highly lauded the contributions of the AMU in conducting researches in Urdu, Arabic and Persian languages in the last 100 years which he said had helped in India building up good relations with the Islamic world. Recalling the contributions of the University during the Corona pandemic and said getting thousands of people to do free tests, building isolation wards, building plasma banks and contributing a large amount to the PM Care Fund by the organization showed the seriousness of fulfilling its obligations to the society. “Today with such organized efforts, India is successfully combating the global epidemic like Corona, keeping the country paramount,” he said.
He said the research carried out at the AMU on Urdu, Arabic and Persian languages, research on Islamic literature, had given new energy to India’s cultural relations with the entire Islamic world. He said the University had the double responsibility to further enhance the soft power of the university as well as fulfilling the obligation of nation building.
Recalling Sir Sayyad’s remark that the ‘the first and foremost duty of one who is concerned about his country is to work for the welfare of all people, irrespective of the caste, creed or religion,’ The Prime Minister stressed that the country was proceeding on a path where every citizen is assured of his or her constitution-given rights, no one should be left behind due one’s religion and this is the basis of the pledge ‘sabka saath, sabka vikas, sabka viswas’.
He gave examples of the government welfare schemes providing benefits without any discrimination like “Jan Dhan Yojana of bank accounts for all without discrimination, pucca houses for all, gas connections to women, health schemes under “Ayushman Bharat” and many more. “Country’s resources belong to each and every citizen and should benefit all. Our government is working with this understanding,” Modi said.
Highlighting the benefits of the government’s New Education Policy, 2020, The Prime Minister said AMU had attracted many from its contemporary curriculum in higher education. He said New National Education Policy has Interdisciplinary subjects similar to one already taught at the university. He said “the youth of our country is committed to advancing the country with the call of Nation First. This aspiration of India’s youth has been given priority in the new National Education Policy.” He said the multiple entry and exit points in the new National Education Policy would make it easier for students to take decisions regarding their education. This would also give the students freedom to take their decision without worrying about the fees of the entire course.
The Prime Minister said the government was also continuously working to increase the number of enrollments and increase seats in higher education. Whether education was online or offline, the Government was working to ensure that it reached everyone and changed everyone’s life. He also urged the AMU students to celebrate the centenary of the institution by conducting research on the lesser known freedom fighters in line with the coming 75th year of India’s independence in 2022.