Friends from industry, from trade-small, big, medium, very good morning to all of you. I am actually very delighted to be in Visakhapatnam for more reasons than one. One, of course, we are today celebrating the International Yoga Day. The third International Yoga Day, which to my mind is a matter of pride for each and every one of us in this room. It was India who has finally arrived on the international stage with the advent of Yoga. The second good reason is that Visakhapatnam has been elected, not selected, elected as the third most clean city in the country. Of course, and while I am at this clean city I must say that my wife who has accompanied me this time was mentioning as we drove in yesterday and today morning when we went for the yoga programme that she suspects this should have been no.1 in the country. And of course, the third important reason why I believe I am delighted to be here is that I am getting to meet all of you to discuss the GST tax regime.

And in all of these three, the common thread is the Prime Minister Shri Narendra Modi. He has brought the International Yoga Day to India. The world unanimously in the United Nation accepted June 21 as International Yoga Day. It was celebrated in 118 countries, demonstrating India’s leadership in the world today. Swachh Bharat is his campaign, which has been carried forward very ably by Hon’ble Chief Minister Chandrababu Naidu Garu in his state. He is the chairman of the sub-committee of the chief ministers. And GST is to my mind, the greatest reform that India has seen in 70 years of independence. It’s a fitting tribute that it will be launched on 30th June at the stroke of midnight from the august precincts of the central hall of parliament, when all of us will be over there, our chief minister Babu Garu will be there.

We will all be celebrating what is going to transform India’s economy, going to transform the way we do business. As Prime Minister said, it’s not GST-Goods and services tax, it’s a great step to transform India, the great step to transform India. It’s like a tricolour which has saffron, which has white, which has green, it unites all of us in one string.

I think you go anywhere in the world when we see the tricolour, we have a respect towards our national flag. We go anywhere in the world when we hear the national anthem, it unites all of us, there is a respect towards it. Similarly, the GST is not just an ordinary tax reform, it is finally making India one nation, one tax in one…..and in that sense, as Hari Babu Garu said, this is not about what the central government desires to do, or what individual desires to do. This will be the success of truly collaborative and cooperative federalism at its finest where every state in the country, every Chief Minister and Finance Minister of each of the states and Union Territories in the country has an equal role along with the central government and with honourable Prime Minister Modi to bring about this reform. And, therefore, this is going to a celebration, not of one individual, not of one party, not of the central government, but it is going to be a celebration of 125 crore Indians where all of us, like beads in a necklace, have contributed to the making of GST. Every Chief Minister, every political party, whether in government in a state or no, a political party may not in government in any of the 28 states. But it may have some members of Parliament in either of two houses, it may some MLAs in the house of any of the states of the Union of India. And everywhere, it has been accepted unanimously. So, to my mind, this is truly history in the making and each one of us in this room are participating in that history so that 50 years, 100 years later, future generations will remember the India of 2017, and each one of you for your role in making GST a grand success.

Of course, when there is such a big transformation, such a big change, obviously, it’s not going to be easy. We have all, after all, I believe most of you here are traders, are businessmen, you all know how difficult it is to run a business. Somebody may be doing a 1 crore business, somebody maybe doing a 20 lakh business, somebody may be doing a 1000 crore business. But the problems are the same in all of our businesses. I understand that because I started my career as a small scale entrepreneur by setting up a small-scale industry in Mumbai in a remote suburb called Dombivli and if I recall correctly, I was only 17 years old at that time, I must have made at least 100 trips to the Maharashtra Industrial Corporation way back in 1979-80 to get a small plot of 2930 meters allotted to start a small scale industry, at least 100 trips.

So whether you run a small business, or you run a large conglomerate, I think we all have challenges. We all see difficulties, but then you will also appreciate when such a massive change is sought to be introduced in the country where several different taxes are all going to be subsumed into one tax, where several different points of problem or points of difficulty or if I may even venture to suggest with due respect to both of you government officials – where several points of harassment are also sought to be subsumed into one. Obviously, the change is not going to be simple.

There were many times this talk that whether we are prepared for GST, whether it should be rolled out on 1^st July or 1^st August or next year or the year after. In Hindi, there is a saying, Kalkare So Aaj Kar, Aaj Kare so Abb! Even if you roll it our 5 years from today, the difficulties will not be any different. It will be the same. You can test the GST and net worth 50 times but as I have observed in my own 30 odd years in service that technology has the great art of failing at the right time.

Of course, at one point of time, the even power used to go away at the right time. In fact, very often, when I am giving a speech power does go away, I hope it doesn’t go away today. And my wife has a very good argument for this, she says God keeps taking away the power everytime you give a speech to remind you that your job is not complete, you have a lot of work more to do.

But, first of all, I want to share with you ladies and gentlemen that when you transform in such a big way, in your own businesses, in your trade, you think when you are doing some – you start a new line of business. Suppose, you start a new shop or you start producing a new product. Don’t we all face teething troubles, don’t we all have some difficulties initially. But as they say, a problem is only a problem till a solution if found, after that it doesn’t remain a problem. And as we move into this new regime, even if we face some difficulties, there will be no problem which is insurmountable, because we trust each other. The government trusts the people of India, the people of India trust Prime Minister Shri Narendra Modi, trust the various leaders that they have elected in the different states and they trust that this is a step in the right direction. It is a step which is going to change the way businesses are conducted in India. And it is this trust which is going to make GST successful. It is the trust of the people of India. It is the trust of business persons in India that finally we can look at a corruption-free India, finally, we can hope that our taxes go to the right place. We pay the right amount of tax, we are not harassed unnecessarily and we can live a life of pride, as businessmen we will not be looked at with suspicion. We will not be looked at as a source of, well, illegitimacy or illegitimate revenues.

We can all plan that if we do our businesses honestly we will have no harassment in our life. And I will briefly try to explain to you why I believe this will be an end to harassment. I very often heard businessmen say, that no I don’t want to do anything illegal, I don’t want to save taxes. But, what do I do, I have to pay bribes, or I have to pay political parties or I have to pay politicians. That is why I am required to do, what do they say, No. 2 ka dhanda? You have on the official book and one unofficial book. You show some transactions in your book, you don’t show some transactions. And, then there is the other sort of businessman who does not want to pay his taxes honestly and who causes so much distress that like say in a market if you have 10 shops selling cloth. If two people don’t pay their taxes honestly, the other 8 are at a disadvantage. Because his product is cheaper, he doesn’t pay his taxes, he doesn’t report his income. And the other 8 will either get outpriced or they will have to join the bandwagon because if you remain competitive they will have to join the bandwagon.

And, then there is the 3^rd category of businessmen who don’t even know what is his tax liability, how he has to pay tax, what needs to be done. So these are the 3 broad categories in which we can categorise all the businessmen – those who are forced to do it, some who do it because they want to evade taxes, some who are ignorant. I will try to explain to you how GST brings them all on one platform and makes doing business simpler, without discrimination helps everybody to compete on fair terms and, ultimately, helps each one of us contribute to wiping the tears of that poor person who does not have electricity in his house, whose children do not get access to good quality education, whose parents cannot afford healthcare, if we have to change the lives of all these people, we will all have to contribute in our own humble way and that contribution will come about through our honest involvement and engagement in the GST.

If you take the first category who believes that he has to do it because he is harassed by any officials or politicians or anybody at all, GST brings good news. Why does it bring good news? Because, in a very simple manner, all that you are required to do is enter the details of whatever sales you are doing and nothing else. Almost everything else is taken care of by the system. The only responsibility on all of us is to enter our sales invoice honestly into the computer programme, for which also I think they are giving the computer software also free. So, to just enter the sales invoice in a computer programme. Maybe at some stage I just thought of it as I am speaking, I will talk to the department when I go back to Delhi. Maybe we can even create a small program on the telephone, on our mobile phone where you can enter your sales invoice on your phone if you don’t even have a computer, even a small hawker in the street in his phone can enter his sales invoice, we have tried to create some software, very easily, you create a mobile app. So, we will do it online, even on a mobile phone it can be done. It’s not a problem.

For the small traders, up to 20 lakhs, there is no need to do even this. They have to maintain no records, pay no taxes at all. And, by the way, when we say no taxes, it means no taxes which earlier would have meant 20 different types of taxes, it could be excise, it could be service tax, it could be VAT, it could be octroi, it could be entry tax, so many different ones has been subsumed into the GST.

For those from 20 lakhs to 75 lakhs, there is also a composition scheme, in the composition scheme, you don’t have to do too many calculations of sales, purchases, this that. All you need to do is total your sales, enter your sales, if your total sales are below 75 lakhs in a year, if you are a trader you pay only 1% composite tax on your turnover. So your turnover is 56 lakh rupees in a year, you pay 56,000 tax and that’s the end of the story. If you are a manufacturer, then you pay 2% as tax and no need for any other record, for small scale manufacturers, up to 75 lakh rupees. Even for those beyond 75 lakhs, there is this concern amongst people that we have to file 3 returns every month, that we have to file some 37 returns every year. This is all nonsense, if I may say so. This is all a certain segment of society which is trying to derail GST because they are worried that GST will bring the entire informal economy and all those in that second category of persons who are deliberately evading taxes will bring all of them into the formal fold. This is some misinformation being spread by certain elements like that.

Whereas the reality is that when you enter the sales invoice in your system, it automatically goes into the account of the purchaser as his purchase invoice, and whatever you are purchasing if you have purchased from anybody when he enters it as a sales invoice, it comes into your purchase register automatically. In fact, in our old days, all the CA students will tell you that you had to enter your own purchase register and you had to enter your own sales register. Now, this may have certain incomes for the first 1-2-3-4-6 months, possibly the matching and this and that. Some people may enter the sales invoice, little mistake in the GST and number of the purchase of the purchaser so it may not go directly into his account. We will get used to this. We will get into the habit of correctly entering the data.

But instead of now entering your purchase data and your sales data, you only have to enter your sales data, nothing else. The moment you enter your sales data, you automatically create the purchase register of all the people who have purchased the goods from you. I think 5^th – up to the 10^th you have to enter the – you have to enter your sales invoice up to the 10^th of the following month. It’s not even compulsory that you have to enter every day, you can enter in one go if you want, you can enter every day if you want, your choice. By 10^th of the next month, say July you will enter by 10^th August, of course, so that the initial …… troubles are taken care of, we have given time up to September for invoices to be entered of July and August, two months.

Up to the 10^th of next month, when you enter all your sales invoices, the automatic purchase register is created by the other person who has purchased, and your purchase register is created from the sales invoice entered by whoever you brought the goods from, then from 11^th to 15^th, you can match the purchase and the sales invoice. You can make sure that all our purchases are entered or no. Those whom you have sold to, they can check that they have got their purchase invoice in their register, if it is missing, you can contact the fellow whom you have purchased from and tell him that look you have not entered your sale and my purchase, please enter it. If that fellow is trying to evade taxes and he doesn’t enter it, you also have the ability to enter your purchase invoice, because the moment you enter the purchase invoice, it will show up as the sale invoice of the person you purchased from.

You remember, I told you that there is this set of people who deliberately evade taxes, in this, it is going to become more and more difficult to evade taxes. Because, if the seller doesn’t enter the invoice and the purchaser enters the invoice then the tax authorities will come to know, oh boy, he’s not paid his taxes, he’s not showing the sale in his books. And that matching that the computer will do will bring to light any informal or illegal transactions that are going on in this country.

And, gradually, I think over a period of time, today, we have about 85 lakh SSCs in the whole country. Imagine, this country where we stay there are 6 crore traders and businessmen, 6 crores in a population of 125 crores. We have only 85 lakh registered people. And, I am not talking of registered only under one law or the other – excise, service tax, VAT, octroi, everything put together. There are only 85 lakh register dealers in this country. It’s another matter, that out of the 85, only 65 lakhs have registered in the GST network so far. I think it’s being opened up again on 15^th June, if any of you has not entered or your clients have not entered, the old holders of account with VAT or excise with service tax, please enter and get into the GST network. You have time from now until 30^thSeptemer, by 30^thSeptemer all those who have an existing excise or VAT number or service tax number should migrate to the new GST network.

I think from 1^st July you have started? Yeah! From 25^th June to till 3 months after that, you have the time to enroll, if you are a new ….., if you are not paying taxes earlier and we are not going to sit and do postmortem. So, please don’t worry, forget the past. We believe in forgiving and forgetting the past, let’s move forward in this new age of India, new world that India is entering into. Anybody who has not paid his taxes in the past, need not worry. Am I right Mr Hariram? We are not going to sit and do a postmortem of the past?

Give your instructions, don’t harass anybody…..come into the formal economy. That was the purpose of demonetization, in demonetization also, if you recall Prime Minister Modi had invited everybody to join the formal movement, formal economy, get out of the old age of working and there is no intention to harass anybody for the past. The intention is to get more and more people to declare their business and their sales Honestly, get into the new GST regime, start showing your sales, declaring your purchases. And, this GSTN network has such analytical ability that, for example, if you have sales of more than 75 lakhs but if you suppress it and try to show your sales at 75 lakhs and go in for composition. But your purchasers, if they enter your invoice in their system, the computer will find out that your sales are more than 75 lakhs. SO, your ability to hide any sale is gradually going to get compressed and eliminated altogether.

So, the important point in this is, focus on honesty and you can sleep peacefully at night, none of these officers can harass you. Be honest and nobody can harass you. But for the dishonest, I think the GSTN Council has kept very heavy penalties. But, we will make sure that you get a good transition period while you are learning the new rules of the game, the new GSTN so that you are not harassed from Day 1. And, if anybody gets harassed while implementing GST, immediately contact your MLAs or your MPs and we will make sure that there is no harassment of anyone. I will give you my personal assurance.

Hari babuji, SamaseRaoji, Madhav,  Vishwa Kumar – you will have to become the ambassadors of GSTN in your area. You will have to become handholding of all of your traders as long as they do it honestly. I remember I gave a personal assurance to the jewellers when the Jewelry Tax was introduced when excise duty on jewellery. I remember having meetings, I used to have long meetings to sort out that problem at that time and I gave my personal assurance that you will not be harassed. And this is about the one-year-old story. In one year, and I have given my mobile number also to everybody if anybody in the country gets harassed I said you contact mine.

You will be amazed in one year, not one person has contacted me, not one person. In one year, not one jeweller contacted me, if at all somebody got harassed, then there must have been something he is hiding or something wrong because of which he didn’t contact me. But, I got one person who came a met me unfortunately from Hyderabad. Of course, I am in Vishakhapatnam so that’s not a problem. Somebody came to me from Hyderabad, not the jeweller himself, some other party worker.

He said, bahut takleef ho raha hai wahan par, Ahmedabad mein bahut harassment ho raha hai. Sir batao, kya baat hai? Let me see. Bahut takleef hai sahib, hamare, you know they even try to put a caste angle to it, he said hamara samaj ko bahut tang kar rahehain! He was trying to get sympathy from you. I said, batao to sahi kya hua hai! You will be amazed at the story. This is after the demonetization. He showed me the papers and I will tell you what the harassment was. The harassment was that this gentleman, jeweller, had deposited Rs 40 crore cash in the first 7 or 8 days after 8^th of November, 2016. And when it was enquired, not 40, sorry, Rs 95 crore cash. And when we enquired from him, the department enquired, I just saw the paper, I threw it at his face. I said never again show me your face. Rs 95 crore of cash deposited in his bank account in the first 8 days. In fact, Bank of Baroda refused to take his deposit, so he went to a neighbouring bank, opened a new account and deposited money there.

Then when the tax officials asked him, where you did you get this 95 crores from? He said, on the 8^th of November, 5000 people came to my shop, each one gave me 2 lakh rupees or whatever amount in cash and purchased future jewellery from me. So the tax officials said, wow, 5000 people came, so it must have been a big mela, because announcement happened at 8 o’clock, time was up to 12 o’clock. In 4 hours, 5000 people came and each one gave 2 lakh rupees, How did you count it? He said I had 8 people who were counting the money. So, we said okay, give us the names of those 8 people or their address so we can talk to them. He said I don’t remember who these people were. They said fine but if 5000 people came, you must have had some security or somebody to look after it. After all, 95 crores you received that evening in 4 hours, everybody carrying bags of money and everybody less than 2 lakh, of course.

So, the security must have been there? He said they all run away! Now, tell me is this a case where, whether Haribabu or Samarasu or anybody is going to get involved or Mr Srinivasan Rao is going to get involved? Honest people – we will give our life for you. Dishonest people – we will not spare you! The clapping is not very enthusiastic about this. Are you happy about this?

So, as I was saying, all those who used to be forced to do corruption, now don’t have to worry, pay your taxes honestly, nobody can harass you. Enter all your sales invoices, sleep peacefully at night. Your purchase register will come automatically from those who have sold the goods to you. Your returns are auto-populated, auto-generated, once all sales come in and your tax rate is there in the sales, your purchases come in automatically on each one of which the GST collected is shown, the computer programme will calculate what tax you have to pay. It’s as simple as that.

So, whether it is your GSTN, GSTN-2A or 2B, they are all so simple. But, it’s not that you have to sit and burn the midnight oil and prepare returns like in the old days. It’s not as if you have to prepare one return for excise, one return for service tax, one return for VAT, all of that is gone. All you have got to do is enter your sales invoice honestly, nothing else. If I have made any technical mistake, because I am not an expert on GSTN, then, of course, Mr Hariram can correct it later on.

But, this is in fact, far simpler than what we were doing. I still remember when I was young and I was a student like these young boys and girls, and happily, I see that more girls seem to be interested in GST than the boys. Oh, the boys are there, I was amazed, I said what is happening. Not that, I am very proud that you are interested in it but I was thinking the boys are boycotting my programme. But, that’s the simplicity. And I must compliment honourable Finance Minister Mr.Arun Jaitley, Finance Secretary Mr.Asmukh Hadia, and the entire team in the centre and states, including our colleagues sitting here who have really put in their best to create a simple network, a simple system, a robust system.

Imagine, a country f 125 crore people, almost every day you will have 50-60 crore sales invoices, every day, which have to be entered in this programme. There is no comparable example in the whole wide world of this nature, there is nothing in the world which is as complex and as large as this programme. Now, tell me ladies and gentlemen, if we have a problem in our small 20 lakh – 50 lakh business, and we are implementing a programme where 40-50 crore invoices have to be entered every day, where crores of traders and businessmen will be online and entering data, accessing data, preparing their sales invoice. Obviously, there will be some difficulty, you know, it will take some time for the programme to mature, to stabilise, to settle down. And, unless you actually get into the water, then you learn to swim. Howsoever much beautiful practice you can do your hand and leg movements on the ground, howsoever much we control the temperature of water, less, more, the flow of water, the height of water, the depth of water; everything, end of the day, till you jump into the pool you won’t learn to swim. Which is why, 1^st July is the right day, we have to launch it on someday, so why not 1^st July.

And, of course, it’s also the foundation day of the Institute of Chartered Accountants of India. So, very appropriate day to launch it also.

 

 

 

State-run Rural Electrification Corp today said as many as 13,685 villages have been electrified till June 20, 2017.

The Rural Electrification Corp is the nodal agency for Deendayal Upadhyaya Gram Jyoti Yojana (DDUGJY), which is an integrated scheme covering all aspects of rural power distribution viz. feeder segregation, system strengthening and metering.

The scheme is aimed at transforming the lifestyle of villagers and bringing in overall socio-economic development in rural areas.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi, in his Independence Day address to the nation on August 15, 2015, pledged to electrify all 18,452 un-electrified villages within 1,000 days.

Thereafter, the REC had taken up village electrification on a mission mode targeting the project completion by May 2018.

The DDUGJY has an outlay of Rs 43,033 crore with a grant of Rs 33,453 crore from the Government of India.

New projects for 32 states/UTs including works of feeder separation, system strengthening, connecting rural households, metering, village electrification and Sansad Adarsh Gram Yojana worth Rs 42,553.17 crore have been approved.

More than 350 Gram Vidyut Abhiyantas (GVA) have been deployed to monitor the progress of village electrification. The GVAs update field photographs, data and other information in the GARV Mobile App (garv.gov.in), which has been developed for ensuring transparency and accountability. PTI KKS MKJ

Source: http://indiatoday.intoday.in/story/rec-says-13685-villages-electrified-so-far/1/983389.html

Secretary Shri PK Pujari ji, Joint Secretary Mr Rajpal, Director General of the Bureau of Energy Efficiency Mr Abhay Bakre, Mr Mark White from the US AID, colleagues from the Ministry of power, my good friend Ajay Mathur who very ably led the BEE for many years, has now moved on to TERI and serving the country through the medium of TERI to promote cleaner and efficient use of electricity and other forms of energy in the country; Sourav Kumar, the Managing Director of Energy Efficiency Services Limited who is spearheading a lot of our energy efficiency programmes, distinguished ladies and gentlemen.

Of course, while the good news is that today the country is set to have a new President very soon next month, a person with very humble beginnings, a person who himself, his family and his forefathers for generations have been the sufferers of so many wrongs that we had for decades and centuries in this country. And, someone who truly reflects the voice of a new India, where every person, every deprived individual, every poor person, every person coming from the villages will have a say, will have a better quality of life. And, in that sense, the nomination of his Excellency, the Governor of Bihar, Professor Ram Nath Kovind, as the presidential nominee for the 2017 election is certainly going to be a landmark in terms of giving that self-respect and that opportunity to every child, every individual in the country.

And, in one sense, the programme that we have today on our hand resonates very well with that fact that what we are trying to do is save that every little bit of waste, which would help to go and power the home of some poor child, somewhere in a village who, otherwise, has been deprived for years and years, decades, in fact, generations. And maybe, help him also come up in life, lead a better quality of life, get quality education and become a integral part of the development story, the growth story of India.

तो एक प्रकार से हम सबके लिए बहुत हर्ष की बात है कि यह जो आज का कार्यक्रम, वैसे तो हमें पता नहीं था कि आज ऐसा कोई announcement आने वाला हा, संभावना भी नहीं थी लग रहा था कि और एक-दो दिन बाद ही होगी नाम की announcement | पर मैं समझता हूँ कि बहुत अच्छी बात है कि आज ही हम यह Energy Conservation Building Code देश के समक्ष रख रहे हैं और आज ही के दिन जिस समाज के लिए, जिस देश की हम कल्पना करते हैं इस देश में उसको और मज़बूत करने के लिए जो हमारी तरफ से एक योगदान है कि बिजली के क्षेत्र में या ऊर्जा के क्षेत्र में wastage ना हो, ऊर्जा वास्तव में एक-एक घर को जाके रोशनी दे, एक-एक के घर में बिजली पहुंचे और उसमें एक बहुत बड़ी कड़ी है बिजली के बचत की |

आखिर मान्य प्रधानमंत्री श्री मोदी जी ने बताया था कि जब आप एक यूनिट बिजली बचाते हैं तो एक प्रकार से उसके wastage, AT&C losses उन सबको अगर मद्देनज़र रखें तो 1.33 unit बिजली उत्पादन करने के समान है | Mr White, every unit of electricity, every kilowatt hour that we save is effectively equivalent to 1.33 kilowatt hour of electricity generated. And, when I had just joined the Ministry, just taken charge of this department, in one of our very early programmes, I think Ajay had only organized, Ajay and Sourav may remember at the Vigyan Bhavan. The honorable Prime Minister had flagged this off that, frankly, energy efficiency is more important energy generation. Because, you are serving the nation and, of course, nobody can deny the variety of benefits in terms of reducing the carbon footprint, addressing this challenge of climate change, being a responsible global citizen in the effort to protect the planet, save the planet.

And, in that sense, I would like to dedicate today’s Energy Conservation Building Code 2017, to all those young children of India, to the future of India, for whose sake I think it is incumbent on all of us in this room and our generation to efficiently utilize every bit of resource, ensure that we implement such progressive and forward looking programmes of the government very diligently, and ensure that we leave behind for the next generation a better world than the one we inherited.

And, in that sense, I think today’s programme comes at an opportune time when the whole world is discussing the possible fallout of a worsening environment, the challenges of temperatures exceeding what the planet can absorb, what the planet can manage with. There is a lot of discourse in the world about certain countries deciding not to pursue the climate change agenda. And even despite all of that, a developing country like India decides to focus its attention, decides to proactively work for a better future for the world is to my mind a great testimony to the commitment of Prime Minister Modi and to the commitment of 1.2 billion people in India who care for the environment, who believe that we have a role to play, who believe that through the collective effort of all citizens of the world, Team India will not be found wanting in our effort to make the world a better place to live in.

I was hearing some of the earlier speakers. The last Energy Conversation Building Code was notified in 2007, and so far, only 10 states have notified it, 11 are under progress. Now, that’s not something to be very-very happy about and I would urge the department and the Bureau of Energy Efficiency to take this up on a mission mode that whoever was considering implementing does the 2017 Code straightaway. We don’t want them to start with the 2007 and then migrate to 2017 – A. B – define a timeframe in which every state will be on board. We don’t have the luxury of time when we are dealing with as essential and important a subject as this.

And, frankly, in my own work in the last 3 years, I believe that mandating something is less important than making it economically viable. I think our department, Sourav you, Ajay you can help in this, all of us, let’s work as a team, let’s put our heads together to see that this becomes an economic necessity, not a mandatory law.  I mean you have the law, get it notified, all that is fine. But, can we make it like our LED programme that it makes eminent economic sense to implement. It’s only a fool today who will not put up LED bulbs in his home now that the cost has been brought down so significantly. They are readily available across the country. And, the payback time is down to 2-3-4 months. You save your electricity bill for years altogether after that, and just the simple rustic intelligence of any human being will help him change, convert to LEDs.

After all, the country couldn’t have sold 580 million LED bulbs today in the last two-two and a half years. 580 million, as against what, under 1 million in the year before this government came in. So, there is huge potential in this country. If we plan more effectively, to communicate with the people, to talk to them about what the benefits are, and frankly, lifecycle is too long. We talk about lifecycle costs and lifecycle improvements. I think one must also recognize that India is a capital-scarce country. We don’t have the luxury of large amounts of capital at very low interest costs. I hope while framing this Code, you have kept in mind the practicality of Indian investment and Indian capital. So, we should not really come up with anything which does not make economic sense to the consumer. It should be something for which he can sense the benefit for himself or the residents of his commercial complex. And, really want to implement it rather than being told to implement it. That should be the approach of our project.

Of course, as you said this is a robust policy. It will help you reduce 30-40 billion kilowatt hours of energy consumption in the existing commercial buildings. Looking at the rapid economic development in the country, and as the services sector particularly expands in the country, I do appreciate that it has a pretty large potential of maybe 300 billion kilowatt hours of saving. But, I would think that the entire programme should be designed in such a way that we look at scale, we bring in the best of technologies into India, promote products which have world class technology integrated with Indian manufacturing skills and ingenuity, made affordable for the common man, and should actually become a way of life.

Are there some architects in this room today? Just about 6 or 8, or 10, and fortunately, for me the younger architects are in this room. But I had said the same thing to you when we launched a similar programme in Maharashtra and Mumbai. Unless we think smart Mr Bakre, we are not going to be able to make these projects successful. I would have ideally liked to address a room full of architects today. After all, they are the ones who are going to make this happen, fail or success, is in their hands. If you mandate the law, you will only get a mandated, well-designed, to suit the mandated structure implementation. But, if you buy-in, if you get the buy-in of all these architects, they will actually go three steps further, help you improvise this Code, for all you know, all these architects and, particularly, my young friends here may actually make you come out with a 2018 Code with their ideas, with their practical on the ground experience.

I know, I was just told that there was extensive stakeholder consultation with the states, I am sure with architect bodies and all also. But, I think we need to, you should be looking at engaging with architects across the country more than you spend time engaging with governments. You will get far better results.

Sourav, I don’t think for the LED programme, we ever forced any government. There was nothing mandatory about it. I think if we had done a mandatory programme, we couldn’t have sold 58 million bulbs, forget 580. So, while on the one hand, the department may pursue the mandating of the policy, I would urge the entire team and all of you who have….. I mean it’s one of those rare occasions that a room is over-full. I am quite amazed myself, at least, not for a subject like Energy Conservation Building Codes. I can imagine if for the first half of yesterday’s cricket match, you were all in a full room.

But, this shows that the young people of India, the youth of India, the next generation. And, if we take a poll here, there are more persons in this room, the better side of 30 or 35 than from our generation, which is a great endorsement of the way the young people, the young boys and girls think. I think it’s a great opportunity for us to engage with the youth. I remember that first film we came out in 2014, December 6^th was it or 4^th? 14^th! The Energy Conservation Day that Piyush Pandey had gifted to our Ministry, the young children who are pointing out to their parents that they have to save electricity.

So, it’s really the youth that you need to engage with. Take this message to schools, to colleges; make them your brand ambassadors. And, you really won’t need to bother about states notifying or not notifying. They will look after the interests of the country, because they understand probably the interest far better than what we have done in the last 40 or 50 or 100 years. In that sense, even your Residential Building Code and your Industrial Code should be out quickly, I don’t have the luxury of time to work at this speed that it comes over so many years. Within this calendar, you should have our Code out for the residential buildings and for the industrial buildings. Persuasion will be the key to its success and its better implementation.

And, I don’t think 200-500 years ago, whenever the Hawa Mahal was constructed in Jaipur or the Mysore Palace was constructed in Mysore, I don’t think it went because of some law that the Hawa Mahal was made the way it is now. It was the consciousness of Indian society, which is why I said for the people of India energy conservation, efficiency is something which comes naturally, it’s in our blood, in our DNA. Of course, using the word DNA is very dangerous. Sometimes, it can be misinterpreted.

But, truly, I don’t know how many of you believe in Vastu, or don’t believe in Vastu. I am not here to discuss superstitious or any of these beliefs or non-beliefs. But, really if somebody studies the principles on which the Vastu theories are made, they are absolutely brilliant. When they talk about sunlight coming in from the east so keep your eastern part open, so that the sun really comes in, you don’t need to have lighting at this time of the day. When they designed their homes for ventilation, air flow, the area where the – usually looking at the flow of wind they would have been designing where the toilet should be situated, which corner of the room the toilet should be situated. There is nothing religious about it ladies and gentlemen. It’s a scientific well thought-out design of a building.

So, for us in India, it’s not something that somebody has to come and teach us. We could possibly teach a thing or two to the rest of the world, provided we are willing to accept our own heritage, our own tradition and not be apologetic about it.

In fact, the way urbanization is increasing, we are probably at about 40 odd percent urban today in India with economic progress as the country gets more and more connected, as the world gets connected more, interconnections between countries, the global connect. I would suggest India’s own urbanization speed is going to be galloping in the next few years. Some estimates suggested that two-third of the buildings which will stand in 2030 are yet to be built. So, it’s a great opportunity for us, unlike probably the West, which will have to retrofit more than the new construction. We have an opportunity to do it smart first time around.

So, for us, it’s really a no-brainer that we should be encouraging this. We should be partnering with the people who design these buildings more than the people who only approve them. We all know that the approval processes will have its own idiosyncrasies; we would rather focus on the efficiency of the creator rather than the approver alone.

Also, while we are on the subject, may be a good idea to see what we can do whether it’s in terms of ensuring low-cost finance, whether it’s in terms of providing support through integrating purchases and bringing down costs. After all, India is a huge market. Once the world recognized that India has this huge potential in LEDs, look at what happened to the pricing of LEDs. The Swedish Minister for Energy was telling me that now Europe is benefitting, he’s the head of the International Energy Agency, Ibrahim Baylan. He said the whole of Europe is benefitting because of India’s LED programme, because prices of LEDs have collapsed in Europe.

After all, when Prime Minister Modi spoke about sustainable lifestyles in Paris, this is exactly what he meant. You can’t have a situation where a large part of the developed world keeps ignoring their contribution to the big mess that we are in and is telling the rest of the world, which is still developing, which is still trying to improve their infrastructure, create a better future for their children, that it is their responsibility to protect the planet.

Many of you may have seen me very often come out with my mobile phone, fortunately, I am not carrying one just now. It’s good for you and good for Mr Mark White also for that matter. I don’t have the images that I wanted to show you. But, any of us who has been to any of these capitals or cities like New York, Washington, London, across the world, the kind of waste that is going on in the whole world, the whole nights we have 100-storey buildings lit up as if there was no tomorrow, with not a single person occupying the building the whole night. And then we are talking about addressing concerns of climate change. Where is the sensitivity to waste?

And, thanks to the efforts of Prime Minister Modi, we were able to get the world to accept that promoting sustainable lifestyles is an integral part of protecting the planet, protecting the globe. Of course, it’s another matter we don’t know whether with what sincerity we can hope to see an effort from the rest of the world to promoting sustainable lifestyles. But, certainly, we in India stand committed to that. We believe that every bit of waste is not good for the people, is not good for the country.

And, therefore, I do hope together all of us can make this programme a grand success. I do hope the Ministry will take this up on a mission mode, aggressively engage with all the stakeholders, not in a bureaucratic fashion but in a progressive business-like manner. Take it to the people, take it to the architects, understand what their concerns, their ideas are. Reformulate to bring in more synergy between what they want, what is in the interests of the people and what’s good for policy makers to implement.

And, we should be willing to learn. I mean I remember, I put up these white LED bulbs with great enthusiasm in a lot of the heritage places, including my own city of Mumbai. And, there was a hue and cry, and I had that hue and cry, including at my own home, with my wife very-very unhappy. And, it’s only after we changed to the yellow lights that we were able to bring out a win-win solution where the beauty of the precincts, the structural beauty, the heritage beauty, all of it could also be protected.

So, I think we should all be willing to learn, all keep an open mind, all be willing to adapt to change, to newer ideas. Of course, initially, we were given to understand, from the security perspective it’s better to have white lights, so we kept on pushing the white light. We thought that it also gives much brighter light, which is good. It will consume less electricity. We can have less wattage. But, then one also has to balance beauty with energy conservation and in a balanced way come up with a win-win which will really get implemented.

So, I am sure we can all look at this in a very mission mode kind of speed. I was told somewhere that EESL has started the process of retrofitting buildings. I think whatever you are doing you just need to expand that a 100-fold, nothing less than that. And, I wish more from the private sector would come up and set up credible and honest businesses around this. Sadly, I have heard of some of the fly by night operators who have been selling or hawking the power audit story, but taking away very large part of the savings, instead of really sharing it with the stakeholders. So, I think some more publicity about what are the broad levels of expenditures that are called for and what kind of savings models are possible, the ESCO model. If publicize will help create more competition, will help newer players come into the field. You yourself should look at expanding massively across the country to promote energy efficiency, building audits and all. I was given a target of, that you are planning to invest a 1000 crores by 2020 in 10,000 buildings over the next 3 years.

Now, Sourav you should know that I can’t accept this kind of a target. I think by 2020, every building in the country should be retrofit. Can anybody argue with that? Isn’t it good for the country? And, just imagine, suppose you save even 10 billion units of electricity, forget the larger savings. Now just juxtapose that to a poor person’s home who doesn’t have electricity and look at his typical need. He needs 3-4 LED bulbs, an energy efficient fan, hopefully, you can give him a cooler, a mobile charging unit, with all of that put together, his consumption in a month will not exceed what, 30-40 kilowatt hours, 70 kilowatt hours, 60 kilowatt hours?

Now, the retrofitting of these buildings that you talked about and you gave me the figure that 30 or 40 billion kilowatt hours of electricity can be saved. Can you imagine, just juxtapose that into a number of households, you could have 50 million households getting free electricity, round the year, out of this saving alone. Just like all of you, and looking at the audience in this room, I would suspect that at least 70-80-90% of you would have participated in the Prime Minister’s clarion call to give up your LPG subsidy, so that some poor women can get a free LPG connection and better her life and her health. Just in that same way, and if suppose each one of us was to take it up as a mission that I will ensure a saving of X number of units of electricity, and, possibly, with that, a sensitive government can give so many million homes or so many hundred homes or so many thousand homes even free electricity if they can’t afford it.

Can you imagine what a national service each one of us would be doing? Can you imagine the satisfaction that you will get? You don’t even need to do it out of charity, do it for yourself. Because, that satisfaction is what you will get.

So, end of the day, the India story is your story. You are the architect of India. You are all going to create the new India, the new India of the dreams of the youth of India. And, it’s only when all of us, collectively, decide that this is going to be a success, that we are going to collectively ensure its success, not by mandate, but because we believe in it. It is that self-belief, that confidence that each one of us  in our ability to shake the destiny of India that is going to truly decide where this country goes from here, what happens to those millions who have yet to see an electric bulb in their life. What happens to that young girl who has never imagined a life as an equal with all these young girls sitting here. Keep them at the back of your mind, keep them in focus, keep them before your eyes and I promise you, we won’t have to have mandated codes, we won’t have to have these programmes. We can really make this happen. We can make this happen fast. We can make this happen well.

Thank you.

Q&A.

Q. Sir, Sundaresan from News Rise, sir I just have one question. Will this Energy Conservation Building Code also have fiscal incentives such as interest subvention on………..?
A.Young man, I don’t believe that success of these programmes should be on the back of subsidies and government intervention. I have often spoken about our programmes on solar water heaters, on LED bulbs. Wherever we remove subsidies and government involvement, we found the roll-out to be much faster, much more efficient, no questions of corruption or any other misuse of government support and also not a barrier to the limits where you can go. So, I personally believe there should be no support, don’t even plan on that, make it economically viable, through its very share of India’s size and scale. That’s my approach.

Q. I am SB Dangahej from Syntex Group of Industries. Just a small question, why can’t we make it a prerequisite now onwards for all the green building certification programmes, whether they are TERI-GRIHA or they are US GBC or IGBC. I believe that from now onwards, all the certificates that are given under these programmes must be compliant and obviously meeting the ECBC 2017.
A.Well, fine. It’s a good suggestion. I have no problem on that. But, all of those certifications, as I said earlier, can keep happening. I am less concerned about certifications. I am more concerned about action on the ground. But, there is no harm. We can talk to these agencies that when they give LEAD and whatever certification – Platinum and Gold and what not, LEAD certifications, we should seriously consider that these are implemented. We can talk to those agencies.

Q.My question is to the honorable Minister. My submission is that although we understand your feeling about this thing that the government, there should be lesser government aids towards the energy conservation and using this energy saving equipments and all that. But, still government has to provide something for that, like you see…..
A.Thank you. I have not much to say. I think I have said enough on this subject.

Q. Sir, GST……
A.GST is all decided, finalized, now move on in life. Please understand ladies and gentlemen, there is a bogey that some people are again and again raising about GST impacting their industry. After all, it’s common for everybody in the country. Now, it’s one nation, one tax. Whatever the tax, it’s the same for everybody. So, I don’t understand where it’s going to impact any particular industry. Frankly, it’s beyond my imagination. I in my power sector am extremely satisfied, the GST regime is very robust. It has given concessions to things where I needed the concession or a lower rate of tax. Beyond that, we have no further demands. We have discussed with our power sector players also. By and large, we are okay. If at all there is any more anomaly we will sort it out afterwards whenever the time comes if there is a legitimate need.

Today, it’s no more an issue. Everybody pays the same tax. It’s as simple thing as that. So, if there is discrimination, and which states had earlier, different states had different structures. One can say that it’s not being promoted enough here or there, on the same rate, it’s a non-issue.

Q. Sir, in the previous Codes, there were some property incentives …………… can we expect them to continue in the …..?
A.It’s a state subject. If any state wants to give some incentives, we are free to give it. But, I personally am not going to be sitting and pleading with them. I believe in two things, (a) I believe as we scale it up and costs come down and we get better technologies in the system, and no practical implementation, we won’t need any subsidies or any incentives. It will be an economic benefit itself for people who are investing in this – point 1.

Point 2 – Even if not so, it will have an impact of Rs 5-10-15 per square foot in a office building which goes for Rs 3000-5000-10,000 a square foot, I think it’s ridiculous to be so petty about talking about some of these small incentives.

And 3^rd and most important, and I hope you will write about that is where is the sensitivity of our nation? Where is the sensitivity of our people? As I said, can we not even be as sensitive enough as to understand that this waste is going to cost the world dear, it’s going to cost our country dear, it’s going to cost our future generation dear. And the saving can go to help light the life of a poor person. So, I think that sensitivity itself is cause enough for a greater and faster roll-out. I have the confidence in the people of India.

Q.(Inaudible)
A.Mandating help, save energy? Well, I think we disproved it after the Give It Up programme. We didn’t do any mandating, we had better success. UDAY – it was voluntary, except for one state in the east, which for whatever reason doesn’t want to take the benefits of that programme for their people of that state. Everybody else is onboard. So mandatory is not required, sensitivity is enough in this country.

Q. (Inaudible) Since the time the standards were first made voluntary and then mandatory, the energy efficiency of air conditioners in India has seen a step change, because of mandated….?
A.Well, you didn’t do your job right in the first place, probably. I am sorry Ajay. Because, same Ajay Mathur rolled out LED programme. What did he mandate, nothing. Even in those air conditioners, if you are on the defensive, then what happened yesterday will happen to your programme. You should play on the front foot.

Q.Sir, my name is …….. When we are talking about the flagship programme smart cities and we are going to see a lot of action here. And, are we thinking that ministerial and bureaucratic machinery has to work very closely with Ministry of Urban Development and Smart Cities, especially …….. to get this in a mission mode?
A.Well, why only smart cities? Do that with the smart cities, I have no problem in that. But, the whole country needs to be smart for us. We want to see a smart India, not just a few smart cities. Of course, that’s a pilot programme. It’s a roll-out of a very-very beautifully designed urban initiative to kick-start faster development of those cities in an organized fashion. But, on energy efficiency, we should be looking at a national pan-India grand scale up, so that the benefits of scale, economies of scale also come to the people of India. These projects should all be self-sustaining.

After my success on solar, on LEDs, now even wind is coming on line, power purchase. You name the item. Wherever we brought transparency, we worked in the new style of governance that Prime Minister Modi has introduced into this country of honesty and integrity. Wherever we looked at the benefits that the people of India deserved to enjoy, in all those programmes we found tremendous success. And, looking at this, I see no reason at all that this cannot be implemented across the country, smart cities included.

Q.Good afternoon sir, myself Jatender Kaur, I am an Associate Professor in the Department of Architecture. So, I have been teaching the students of architecture since last 20 years, so I have specially come for this event since I was really interested. I have just felt that there is a very strong need for BWE to collaborate with the students also. I mean the Council of Architecture is one body which is governing us, so if Energy Conservation Building Code training programmes can be, I mean there should be a sort of collaboration, those people, they should mandate us or they should tell us at least that Energy Conservation Building Codes should be taught to the students may be as a part of the training programme for a few weeks only.
A.Madam thank you for being here. I am absolutely delighted to accept your suggestion. Where is this Council of Architecture situated in Delhi? So before the day is out, I want somebody from your department or you yourself contact them whoever is the President or the Secretary or whatever. And discuss with them, sign up with them before the end of this week and plan out the roll-out how this is going to reach out to every architect and every institution in the country. Thank you, good suggestion.

Q.If there is a commercially viable solution that you are talking about, how would we roll it out to all the government buildings…..?
A. Absolutely, good point. But, by the way, you saw that if the mike didn’t work. Our Indian voice is loud enough to be heard even without a mike. That should be the spirit while implementing our projects. Right? But, you are absolutely right. Pujari sahib, talk to all your colleagues and your batch mates, right away, and let’s get all the states and the central government buildings, our PSUs, all of them at least commit to adopt this in a defined timeframe. Good point sir, appreciate it.

Q.Sir, my name is Gourav Mathur, I am from ….. Pumps. So, it’s a pump industry, it was one of the greatest consumers of energy in buildings. My question to you sir is that most of the time when any programme is implemented the greater focus is on bringing in the technology, and later on the commissioning and the working throughout the lifecycle is not being monitored. So, if we can connect the initial implementation of the best technologies, at the same time we also ensure that the equipments which we have installed they work in the most efficient manner. Selecting an efficient equipment is one and making it adaptive to the changes of the building is second point. So, if we can look at that.

In second sir, we don’t want monetary benefits, but if some of the buildings are really doing good work that should be projected and they should be brought as role models and maybe in media or on your website, they should be brought forward as the role models.
A.Gentlemen, both very good questions. Of course, the second one is a little difficult for me to implement because sadly, there is very little space in the media today for good news. मेरा तो गला बैठ जाता है बोल बोलके यह किया, वह किया, यह करना चाहिए तो पता नहीं 20^th page में भी mention नहीं आता है उसका | They are still searching कि क्या चीज़ पर controversy create कर सके, breaking news क्या होगी |

Of course, don’t blame the media alone. All of you also introspect. If a Doordarshan programme is telling you about Soil Health Card, how many of you sit and watch it? You will not! But if there is an unfortunate distress somewhere, you will be glued to the television all through. Instead of that, if we were all to be even more concerned कि Soil Health Card कैसे implement हो? How can we help the farmer assess what production is ideal for his farm, how he can increase productivity, may be save energy and give the farmer also cheaper or low-cost affordable energy so that his pump which you manufacture can be put to use and help him get more income.

So, this is something where all of us have to collectively introspect and see what is our role. Very easy to say government should promote…… if I take out advertisements you will again criticize me that I am showing off or I am taking out advertisements to, just to talk about what good work we are doing. So, in every respect, this is something where, collectively, everybody will have to be more conscious.

And as regards quality, even when we did the LED programme, our quality specs are amongst the finest in the world, if not the finest. In fact, Secretary Moniz, I am told at some of the Clean Energy Ministerials has very loudly complimented India for our energy efficiency programme for being really benchmark for the rest of the world to follow. But I appreciate, quality is, we should not compromise on quality. However, while defining the code we have to be technology-neutral, agnostic to different technologies. I think that was one of the things that I read just now that while preparing this code we have ensured that they are not using any particular technologies. It’s technology agnostic. So that will be our approach to all of these things. While recognizing the good quality is very important, just in the garb of good quality we can’t load too much costs also.

India is a capital constrained country, we must recognize that.  Second, sometimes you can get a Mercedes Benz or a old Fiat Car to reach your destination. India has not yet reached a state that a 1.2 billion people, and don’t take it literally, I just use it as an example. कोई इसको misquote मत कर देना, by the way. What I mean to say is everybody is not yet got the luxury of large incomes or 60,000-70,000 dollars per capita income annually to be able to afford the best of class of everything. But, let not the best be the enemy of the good, you know.

So, we should be practical, see what our pocket can afford.  What will still get us to our destination. Maybe we won’t save 38% energy but we may save 33% energy at one-third the cost. But, I would rather save 33% at one-third than live in a Utopian world where I wait for myself to have the ability to spend more and save 38%. So, we have to have a practical approach in these things.

Q.Sir, thank you so much for bringing out this issue of marrying duty with efficiency, I think as an architect that’s essentially a most important part of making buildings. But, you know, sir apart from technology and education one very important of efficiency is communication and when you talk you talk about energy efficiency in buildings, it’s actually hidden. Nobody knows. So, one of the measures that’s been very successful as a voluntary measure is for people to declare their building’s energy use, give labeling for buildings that perform better and that has something that public can engage with directly.
A.Well true, I agree with you. Why don’t you also sit with Mr Bakre and maybe over a cup of tea after the programme. And, you look to be an architect I believe? So, help us in designing that, help us in creating that awareness, it’s a very good idea. In fact, in my own work some of you may know that I have tonnes and tonnes of mobile apps. What’s the purpose of these apps? For some, it may be that I am showing off because I have had some good achievements under Prime Minister Modi’s leadership. But, the bigger idea is to keep the people informed and engaged that they can be a part of that.

So, when I have my app which speaks about Ujala, the LED bulbs programme, when people read that and they see that, oh my God, they have already sold, one government company has sold 242 million LED bulbs in the last 2 years and 3 months, it encourages others to follow. Because on the back of that, even the private sector has sold 332 million bulbs, which put together really is, probably, the world’s largest roll-out of LEDs in such a short span of time.

So, there is a demonstration effect which you are talking about, same knowing this programme, it would be great if we could encourage buildings to show on their name plate itself how energy efficient they are, how much net energy they are consuming or how much they are generating, what is their saving and all that. It’s a great idea but we will need the buy-in of all the architects, now that I certainly can’t mandate. So, that will have to come more from the consciousness of building owners and architects. But, I promise you, it will be a great selling point. Everybody who enters that building will pause for a moment to read that. I would pause, I don’t know many of you, but I would pause to read if that data was available as I entered a building.

So, it’s a great idea. Please discuss, see how we can make people aware, can we make some standards or some common ways on a per square foot basis what consumption is there in this building, something simple, nice, cute and simple. So, it is not so complicated like your calculations and all that you have put into this all those charts, वह सब मत बनाना ज़रा | Make it very simple that a common layman, uneducated guy like me can also understand.

Thank you very much sir.