सभी महानुभाव जो आज इस बहुत ही महत्वपूर्ण चमनलाल जी के नौवें मेमोरियल लेक्चर के लिए आये सम्मानीय भाईयों और बहनों | वास्तव में जब समय बीत जाता है तो कई बार यादें भी आहिस्ते-आहिस्ते fade away कर जाती हैं तो जब श्याम परान्वे जी ने मुझे पहली बार फ़ोन पे कहा कि ऐसा ऐसा लेक्चर कर रहे हैं उसमें आपको आना है | तो मैं नहीं समझता हूँ मैं कोई detail में भी गया, मैंने तो तुरंत ही उनको कहा हाँ जो दिन है, जो समय है, जो स्थान है वहां पे मैं आना चाहूँगा, और कुछ नहीं तो मुझे लगा कि एक मौका फिर से मिलेगा जो संस्कार जिस प्रकार से मान्य चमनलाल जी ने विश्व विभाग को संभाला और जिस प्रकार से मैं समझता हूँ अनगिनत मौकों पे मुझे उन्होंने केशव कुन्ज में बहुत ही प्यार से receive किया, मेरे साथ बातें की और कई बार तो हम घंटों गप्पे लगाते थे | मुझे तो लगा कि एक प्रकार से फिर एक बार चमनलाल जी की याद भी आएगी और फिर एक बार चमनलाल जी के उन संस्कारों के बारे में भी मुझे ध्यान आएगा, ध्यान आकर्षित होगा जो मैं समझता हूँ हम सबको अपने मार्ग पर रखते हैं, हम सबको सही दिशा दिखाते रहते हैं |

राष्ट्रीय स्वयंसेवक संघ हमारा वैचारिक परिवार ही नहीं है, एक प्रकार से हमारी moral authority भी है | मैं तो कई जगहों पर जिकर करता हूँ कि हर संस्था, हर व्यक्ति को कोई न कोई उसके ऊपर निगरानी रख रहा है, कोई न कोई उसके ऊपर ध्यान दे रहा है, संस्था हो या व्यक्ति हो, ऐसा कोई न कोई एक moral authority होना बहुत ज़रूरी होता है | और मैं समझता हूँ अगर मेरे जीवन में मुझे सबसे बड़ा लाभ मिला है इस moral authority का तो वह राष्ट्रीय स्वयंसेवक संघ का मिला है, जिस प्रकार से हम काम कर रहे हैं, जिस प्रकार से दिनो-दिन अलग अलग राजनीतिक क्षेत्रों में opportunities आती हैं to go straight वह इतनी ज्यादा और इतनी भयंकर होती हैं कि ऐसे में हमारे ऊपर निगरानी रखने वाले कुछ बहुत ही दृढ़  संकल्प और राष्ट्र सेवा और राष्ट्र निर्माण के प्रति संकल्पित लोग और संस्था जब हम सबके ऊपर उनका साया होता है, हम सब पर उनका आशीर्वाद होता है तो मैं समझता हूँ हम सबका काम भी सरल हो जाता है और काम करने में जो outcomes हैं, जो काम करने का जो very purpose है वह defined भी रहता है और वह purpose से हम गुमराह नहीं जाते हैं, हम गलत भटक नहीं जाते हैं |

और एक प्रकार से मान्य चमनलाल जी का भी जो काम करने की पद्धति थी वह इसी प्रकार की थी, उनका स्वभाव तो बहुत ही सौम्य था | कई बार तो शायद सुनने को भी तकलीफ होती थी वह क्या कह रहे हैं, इतने soft-spoken थे इतने,आपने कभी उनको नाराज़ होते देखा क्या, मैंने तो नहीं देखा कभी | I don’t think हम मैं से किसी ने उनको गुस्सा होते हुए या कोई ऊंची ध्वनि में बोलते हुए भी देखा हो, it’s possibly not possible. He was probably one of the most understated tall leaders that I have ever come across in my life. और मैं समझता हूँ आज भी विदेश से कई लोग आते हैं, कई स्वयंसेवक बंधु आते हैं उनको आज भी चमनलाल जी याद आते हैं, चमनलाल जी का बताया हुआ मार्ग रहता है, चमनलाल जी के बताये हुए कार्यक्रम याद रहते हैं | और मुझे याद नहीं है शायद श्याम जी भी उस दिन थे तो मुझे याद है मेरी शादी में तो आये थे मान्य चमनलाल जी लेकिन शादी के बाद मैं हनीमून पे जब जा रहा था, विदेश जाने का अवसर बना तो मान्य चमनलाल जी के पास आया था और मुंबई में अपने नवयुग कार्यालय में, नवयुग कार्यालय में रुके हुए थे, शायद मान्य भिड़े जी भी थे, मान्य चमनलाल जी भी थे और उन्होंने मुझे हर जगह पे, जिधर जिधर मुझे जाना था, तीन-तीन चार-चार नाम और इतने प्यार से निकाला एक एक, अच्छा यह व्यक्ति से इस प्रकार का संकट हो तो यह आपका ध्यान रखेंगे, इस प्रकार का काम हो तो यह देखेंगे, हर जगह पर मुझे किसी प्रकार की कठिनाई न आ पाए इतनी चिंता करके उन्होंने और अपनी वह छोटी सी लिपि में लिखते थे, पूरी details नाम, पता, phone number, fortunately, mobile phones नहीं थे और शायद उन्होंने आखरी तक mobile phone नहीं use किया चमनलाल जी ने | और एक parental love and affection कि शायद मेरे माता-पिता ने कोई इतनी चिंता नहीं करी कि तू बाहर जा रहा है, पहली बार जा रहा है क्या होगा, क्या नहीं होगा | उनको ज्यादा चिंता लगी हुई थी मेरी |

और इस प्रकार का एक जो उनका स्वभाव था दूसरों के प्रति संवेदना, दूसरों के प्रति चिंता, यही शायद आकर्षित करता था हम सबको बार बार केशव कुंज की तरफ | और शायद केशव कुंज में इतने लंबे अरसे तक मैं समझता हूँ right after partition, 1948 से ही उनका स्थान केशव कुंज में रहा, छोटी सी खोली में, उसी में पूरा उनका काम रहता था, उनके रिकार्ड्स रहते थे | बड़े से बड़ा व्यक्ति उनके वहां पे अपने आपको एक प्रकार से धन्य महसूस करता था जब उनको मौका मिलता था मान्य चमनलाल जी के यहाँ जाने का | माने करोड़पति  हो या एक बहुत साधारण स्वयंसेवक कोई छोटी जगह से गाँव से आया हो, सबके साथ सामान्य व्यवहार, सबके साथ एकात्म का व्यव्हार और सबके लिए एक तरीके की चिंता उनमें रहती थी, कोई भेदभाव नहीं | ऐसा कुछ नहीं कि कोई बड़ा व्यक्ति आ गया तो कोई हम जैसे छोटे कार्यकर्ता को साइड में कर दिया और वह उनकी चिंता करने लग गए, सबके लिए दिल में एक तरीके का उनके दिल में भावना रहती थी | और एक प्रकार से मैं एक वाक्य देख रहा था रबिन्द्रनाथ टैगोर जी का जो उनके व्यक्तित्व को सही तरीके से कैप्चर करता है – We come nearest to the great when we are great in humility. और जो humility मान्य चमनलाल जी में थी वह humility एक प्रकार से उनकी greatness भी थी और वह greatness के नजदीक आने का जब हम सबको स्वभाग्य मिलता था तब हमारा भी चरित्र बनता था, हमें भी आगे के लिए एक मार्ग दीखता था|

और उनके पूरे काम के ढंग में अगर हम याद करें तो बहुत सारी management philosophies भी थीं, ऐसा नहीं है कि कोई वह, after all, botany वगैरा पढके जब आये थे लाहौर से उनमें ऐसा नहीं था कि कोई वह सिर्फ एक, और उनके कपड़ों वगैरा का तो आपने भी जिकर किया press तो शायद उन्होंने life में कभी किया होगा | अच्छा कपडे भी घर आते थे रुकते थे तो साधारणतः सभी के कपडे धुलते थे लेकिन उनके कपडे उन्होंने कभी किसी को नहीं दिए धोने के लिए | I think he would wash his own clothes, अपने आप टांगते थे और वह एक झोला लगाके छोटा सा बैग लेके, बैग में कपडे कम कागज़ ज्यादा, किताबें ज्यादा | वह विद्यार्थी परिषद् की diary use किया करते थे जहां तक मुझे याद है | और हर चीज़ में सरलता की शायद पराकाष्ठा और जो 3 qualities मैं समझता हूँ हम मैं से किसी को भी अगर ख़ुशी देखनी है, ख़ुशी महसूस करनी है, we want to experience true happiness तो I think there are only three real ingredients of happiness. अगर हम तीन को और यह सबसे मुश्किल है, इन तीन को प्राप्त करना, इन तीन को अपनाना और शायद चमनलाल जी ने इन तीन को बहुत young age में अपना लिया था जिसकी वजह से वह always खुश रहते थे |

पहला devotion – भक्ति भाव, और 70 वर्ष तक जिस प्रकार से उन्होंने संघ की सेवा की है और मैं समझता हूँ इस रूम में हम लगभग सभी से ज्यादा उमर की तो उनकी सिर्फ संघ आयु रही होगी | दूसरा शक्ति – sheer strength, strength of conviction, strength of your own moral values, strength to work hard to persevere in the most adverse circumstances to persevere, उस प्रकार की शक्ति और युक्ति | The skill to navigate difficulties, the skill to navigate your idea and take it forward. आखिर जब देश-विदेश से दुनिया भर से लोग उनके पास आते थे, विदेश विभाग का काम वह देखते थे तो स्वभाविक है कि दुनिया में अलग अलग जगह पे बहुत successful लोग हैं, अलग अलग विचारों से आते हैं, अलग अलग भावनाएं होती हैं उनकी, अलग अलग विचार भी होते हैं संघ के प्रति, भारत के प्रति, धर्म के प्रति लेकिन कभी किसी के साथ वह argue नहीं करते थे, skillfully tackle करके अपनी विचारधारा से जोड़ना, skillfully व्यक्ति को जोड़ना अपने से, एक अपनेपन में उसको रिश्ते को बनाना |

भक्ति, शक्ति और युक्ति, इन तीनों का अगर समन्वय किसी व्यक्ति में मैंने पाया है तो मान्य चमनलाल जी के व्यक्तित्व में था और उसमें से हम सब स्वयंसेवकों को, कार्यकर्ताओं को बहुत सीखने को मिलता है | शायद आज आपने मुझे यहाँ बुलाके मुझे भी थोडा introspect करने के लिए लगाया है, मैं तो at the slightest चिंगारी चीखने-चिल्लाने लग जाता हूँ, नाराज़ हो जाता हूँ, गुस्सा करता हूँ, अधिकारियों पर भी नाराज़ हो जाता हूँ | शायद आपने मुझे एक wake-up call के लिए यहाँ पे बुलाया है, एक मौका दिया है | Is that more effective or was Chamanlalji’s method more effective?

और जिस प्रकार से उन्होंने अपने काम का विस्तार किया उससे मुझे आज ज़रूर महसूस हो रहा है कि शायद it’s, एक अपने आपको calm and composed रखके अपने विचार को और अपनी बात को हम ज्यादा effectively पहुंचा सकते हैं | मेरे कुछ स्टाफ के लोग भी यहाँ हैं तो शायद मेरे ऊपर चेक रखने विजय है यहाँ पे, स्वयंसेवक ही है, उसको कहूँगा आगे से मेरे ऊपर चेक रखे | When I am losing my temper एक छोटी chit भेज देना सिर्फ लिख देना मान्य चमनलाल जी |

और हमारे जो शाखा में रोज़ जो प्रार्थना करते हैं या जो अलग अलग हम गीत गाते हैं शाखा में, कार्यक्रमों में उसमें जो भाव होता है उसके प्रतीक के रूप में अगर कोई एक ideal स्वयंसेवक, ideal प्रचारक की कभी श्रेणी बने, कभी कोई listing हो और सभी प्रार्थना के भी सभी विषय और अपने अलग अलग गीतों के अलग अलग बिंदु को अगर हम map out  करें और फिर ranking करें या marking करें तो मैं समझता हूँ चमनलाल जी will be right amongst the top few leaders that we have had of the Sangh Parivar. तन समर्पित, मन समर्पित और यह जीवन समर्पित, इस प्रकार का complete devotion, absolutely uncompromising integrity, faith and idealism. इस प्रकार का व्यक्तित्व बनाना, इस प्रकार के जीवन को पूरा जीना मैं समझता हूँ बहुत ही कठिन कार्य है | हम अगर उसका एक छोटा अंश भी अपने में ले पाएं और उसको दिनो-दिन काम में implement कर पाएं तो मैं समझता हूँ हमारा जीवन भी धन्य हो जायेगा, हमारा काम भी और ज्यादा सफल होगा |

वास्तव में आज का जो subject है यह भी बड़ा ही appropriate है | मैं देख रहा था जो पहले 8 subjects थे while each one of them was very very appropriate what the West can learn from India, strategic thinking of Bharat. एक प्रकार से चमनलाल जी का जो विश्वव्यापी सोच और काम था उसके हिसाब से ही आपने सब subjects choose किये हैं | लेकिन आज का जो subject है इसकी तरफ अगर देखें तो एक, the essence of Hinduism and Sikhism, यह दोनों का अगर balance करने के लिए हम कोई विषय चुनें उसमें एक प्रकार से दारा शिकोह जी की जो कल्पना थी जो सोच थी वह reflect करती है | एक incident था दारा शिकोह के संबंध में कि अगर आप कोई फूल को देखें तो जो हाथ फूल काटता है पेड़ से, और एक प्रकार से उससे जीवन छीन लेता है, और कोई हाथ जो वह फूल समर्पित करता है, मुझे भी फूल दिए गए, उन दोनों हाथ को perfume, या इत्र या सुगंध तो उतनी ही मिलती है उस फूल से, जो काटता है जो भेंट देता है | या जो axe है, the axe that cuts a tree, maybe a sandalwood tree, तो जो हाथ या जो axe ने sandalwood tree को काटा वह axe को भी उतना ही sandalwood का perfume या sandalwood की essence उसपे भी लगती है, even the axe which has cut that tree. And this was Guru Har Raiji’s response to his followers when he was questioned why he was helping Dara Shikoh, particularly, given that he was the son of Shah Jahan. और शाह जहान जी का तो पिछले सिख गुरुओं के साथ बहुत मतभेद रहता था उसके बावजूद जब गुरु हर राय जी ने दारा शिकोह जी को समर्थन दिया उनके साथ जुड़े | तब यह response दिया गया कि जो अच्छा काम कर रहा है जो अपने काम से प्रभाव फैला रहा है समाज में उनका हमें समर्थन करना है, उनको हमें उनका साथ जुड़ना यह देशहित का काम है |

वैसे दारा शिकोह को तो शायद यह देश भूल ही चुका था जबतक उनके नाम पे अभी अभी हाल में शायद 6 फरवरी, 2017 को उनके नाम पे Dalhousie Road को बदल के Dara Shikoh का नाम दिया प्रधानमंत्री मोदी जी के नेतृत्व में यह निर्णय लिया गया और वेंकैया नायडू जी ने नाम बदला | और सालों साल बाद किसी ने पहचाना होगा दारा शिकोह को, to be honest with you मुझे भी उसी टाइम मालूम पड़ा इनके व्यक्तित्व के बारे में | और वैसे तो normal course में he would have been the natural successor to Shah Jahan, but for Aurangzeb. And it is most appropriate कि हमने Aurangzeb Road का भी नाम बदल दिया |

और दारा शिकोह की मिशन क्या थी लाइफ में? He was a devout Sufi. And I am sure Dr Mohammad is a far more enlightened and learned person about him but from whatever I could gather, his greatest mission in life was the promotion of peace and conquer between the followers of Hinduism and Islam. और एक प्रकार से इस सरकार का भी जो पूरा सोच एक sentence में या एक वक्तव्य में कैप्चर करने की कोशिश करें – सबका साथ, सबका विकास – एक प्रकार से उसी विचारधारा को हम आगे लेके जा रहे हैं | और इतनी ग़लतफ़हमियाँ हैं इस समाज में, इतनी ग़लतफ़हमियाँ हैं पत्रकारों में राष्ट्रीय स्वयंसेवक संघ के बारे में, भारतीय जनता पार्टी के बारे में | हाँ यह बात ज़रूर है कि अब जैसे जैसे हमारे निकट आ रहे हैं, परिवर्तन देख रहे हैं, हमारे काम से अवगत हो रहे हैं | लोगों में भी भावनाएं बदल रही हैं, लोगों को भी समझ में आ रहा है कि किस प्रकार से राष्ट्रीय स्वयंसेवक संघ से निकला हुआ स्वयंसेवक और भारतीय जनता पार्टी का कार्यकर्ता कैसे समाज को एकजुट करने में लगा हुआ है, कैसे समाज में भेदभाव ख़त्म करने में लगा हुआ है |

मैं तो कई forums पे कहता हूँ मुझे भी in a small way शायद कई decades हो गए हैं, 37 साल हो गए हैं जबसे शाखा में जाने का अवसर मिला, not that I was a very regular स्वयंसेवक, मैंने कोई दिनों-दिन शाखा attend नहीं की है और उसकी responsibility कुछ मात्रा में मैं संघ के अधिकारियों पे ही डालता हूँ | चमनलाल जी की तरह मेरा दूसरा जो संपर्क और शायद ज्यादा घनिष्ट संपर्क आया मान्य भौरव जी से आया है और मेरे सालों तक मेरी उनसे यह शिकायत रहती थी कि हम अपनी uniform क्यों नहीं change करते | और वह इसलिए रहती थी अब तो थोडा हट्टा-कट्टा हो गया हूँ पहले में 50 किलो का एक बड़ा पतला … सा लड़का था और शर्म आती थी कि वह अपने गणवेश में मैं शाखा जाने से डरता था और मैं मान्य भौरव जी से हर बार argue करता था कि यह हम शाखा में uniform क्यों नहीं बदल रहे हैं | Of course, उनका answer भी बड़ा interesting था, I am diverting from the subject but since याद आ गया उनका answer बड़ा appropriate था | He said we are very open, हम बदल सकते हैं हमें कोई गणवेश यही होना चाहिए ऐसी कोई धारणा नहीं है, तुम कोई नया design बनवाके दिखाओ जिसके दो-तीन मापदंड होने चाहिए – कपडा पूरे देश में सब जगह वह वाला उपलब्ध होना चाहिए, सस्ता होना चाहिए जो हर एक स्वयंसेवक afford कर सके और गन्दा नहीं होना चाहिए जब वह शाखा में खेलकूद हो, ख़राब न हो |

और वास्तव में मैं कोई answer दे नहीं पाया पर शाखा का लाभ मुझे बहुत मिला, शाखा में जिस प्रकार से बौद्धिक के माध्यम से हमको सीख मिलती थी | और मैं कहना यह चाह रहा था कि मैंने आजतक 35-37 वर्ष में कभी किसी संघ अधिकारी को, एक भी नहीं आजतक मुझे यह कहते हुए देखा कि आप लोग समाज में भेदभाव करो या आप कोई किसी के प्रति hate करो, या आप किसी के विरोध में काम करो – never once in my life. पर यह धारणाएं समाज में शायद कुछ vested interests ने create करने में अपना खुद का अस्तित्व या खुद का लाभ देखा होगा जिस की वजह से यह धारणाएं चलीं | लेकिन एक अच्छा मौका है जब पूरे देश में आज एक नयी पहचान बन रही है राष्ट्रीय स्वयंसेवक संघ हमारे विचारधारा के अन्य अन्य संस्थाओं के समाजसेवक कार्यों की जिस प्रकार से भारतीय जनता पार्टी के सबका साथ, सबका विकास एक पूरे समाज को साथ लेके जाके, पूरे समाज का सुधार करने का जो काम है यह एक प्रकार से जो सीख मान्य चमनलाल जी जैसे हमारे वरिष्ट प्रचारकों ने, नेताओं ने इतने वर्षों तक अपने काम से हम सबको दी, जिस प्रकार से दारा शिकोह जी जैसे जिन्होंने अपनी गद्दी त्याग दी, लेकिन समाज में हिन्दू-मुस्लिम एक जुट होकर रहें |

उन्होंने ने तो मैंने सुना 360 साल पहले 50 उपनिषदों का भी translation किया संस्कृत से पर्शियन में, 1657 में | अब यह उस समय इतना बड़ा सोच रखना वास्तव में एक बहुत बड़ी बात है, बहुत गर्व की बात है इस देश के लिए और मैं समझता हूँ it is most appropriate कि आज मान्य चमनलाल जी के याददाश्त में, उनकी memory में यह 9वां memorial lecture इस विषय को आगे बढ़ाएगा | मैं समझता हूँ जिस प्रकार से मान्य चमनलाल जी ने राष्ट्रीय स्वयंसेवक संघ के काम को पूरा विश्वव्यापी बनाया उसी प्रकार से कुछ मात्रा में हम सब आज के स्वयंसेवक अपने अपने क्षेत्र में, अपने अपने कार्य से वही सोच, वही भारत का मेसेज अगर पूरे विश्व में ले के जाते हैं तो सचमुच में वासुदेव कुटुम्बकम की जो भावना है कि पूरा विश्व एक है और हम पूरे विश्व की चिंता करके भारत का विकास करेंगे इस भावना को हम अच्छी तरीके से और बढ़ा सकेंगे | देश की छवि आज पूरे विश्व में एक बड़ी progressive, the fastest growing large economy in the world, भारत leadership दे रहा है पूरे विश्व को, विश्व की सोच को बदल रहा है, विश्व की सोच को और आधुनिक भी बना रहा है और आध्यात्मिक भी बना रहा है | इस प्रकार के भारत और इस प्रकार के विश्व के चिंतन में मान्य चमनलाल जी की कही हुई बातें, दिखाया हुआ रास्ता हम सबको दीप की तरह रास्ता दिखाते रहेगा ऐसा मुझे पूरा विश्वास है |

मैं सभी आयोजकों का तहे दिल से धन्यवाद करता हूँ कि मुझे आज आपने आने का मौका दिया और माफ़ी चाहता हूँ कि थोडा विलंभ भी हो गया अपने questions answer कर रहा था, Friday है Monday Parliament को छुट्टी है लेकिन हमारी तो duties fulfill आज करनी ही पड़ेंगी वह ख़त्म करके आने में थोड़ी विलंभ हुई और cabinet के कारण मुझे जल्दी जाना पड़ रहा है पर मुझे, उसके लिए मैं दत्ता जी आप से, मनमोहन जी आपसे और सभी आयोजकों से माफ़ी चाहता हूँ |

बहुत बहुत धन्यवाद |

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Thank you Ritu, my colleagues Mr Pujari, Mr Sushil Kumar; Additional Secretary Ms Shalini Prasad; Chairman REC, Joint Secretary, Ministry of Power, Mr Verma, several distinguished Chairmen of PSUs under the charge of Power and Coal, analysts from different companies and banks from across the country, my very dear friends from the media, often have to take a little bit of joke from me but I do hope they take it in the right spirit, and not get disturbed about what I say. I still feel Shreya is not smiling, why is that so Shreya? My dear friends, ladies and gentlemen!

At about 11 o’clock this morning I got a message, you know a lot of people keep sending those messages, unsolicited SMSs to you which said ‘when life is sweet say thank you and celebrate, when life is bitter say thank you and grow.’ And in some sense, when I became a Minister in the Power Department, I didn’t know whether to celebrate, say thank you, or be worried about the future. But one thing I can assure you, we did not allow my inexperience in this sector to get in the way of my ambition. And that ambition was well set out by honorable Prime Minister Shri Narendra Modi. He is committed and his government has resolved that we will ensure the entire nation and the people of this country, the 120 crore people of this country, get assured, quality, affordable, reliable, 24/7 power. Every citizen of this country needs electricity deserves to get electricity in his home, in his office, in his business, in his farm, and that’s a commitment that we have made to the people of India. That’s a commitment that all my colleagues and I stand before you to achieve, and we have no hesitation in reaffirming our commitment to make sure that the entire country enjoys the fruit of development, gets electricity at their home, at their workplace, quality power, 24/7 power, power for all.

In fact, UDAY has been one of the most comprehensive measures ever planned or created or crafted for reform for a better power sector in the country. I was just trying to describe it in juxtaposition to federalism. The honorable Finance Minister has just now, about an hour ago, tabled in the Lok Sabha the first shining example of collaborative federalism where a federal institution in the form of the GST Council is taking shape, is getting legal sanctity, is getting powers to operate. And it’s a shining example of this government’s commitment to federalism. The fact that both the centre and the states have let go what they had as their fiefdom, what was their power and allowed a new institution, like the GST Council, to come into being which will work in the spirit of consensus, in the spirit of togetherness, in the spirit of one nation. And in some sense, UDAY also takes pride in being a shining example. And if I may draw on the letter ‘C’, it’s a classic case of Comprehensive, Cooperative, Collaborative, Competitive, Consensual and Compassionate federalism. And every one of those elements that I have mentioned has resonance in UDAY.

Compassion because UDAY equally finds it important to reach out to the 5 crore families or whatever number are now left – 4 crore 76 lakhs – as per my last viewing of the GARV app. The fact that these people deserve to get power, it is a bounden duty of all of us to ensure that every family gets power, is also a element of UDAY, it’s the compassion that we should have as a nation.

Competitive federalism because states are competing in the transparent manner to get the best that is available, whether it’s coal linkages, coal auctions, coal blocks; whether it is availability of power through DEEP portal, through Vidyut Pravah, the data and through that the purchase of power through DEEP portal in a competitive manner so that every state can compete to make their power cost cheap or low.

Consensual approach because the entire UDAY programme was voluntary. And I must compliment the team which has persistently worked with the states, and today we have celebrated the Silver Jubilee – 26 states after today’s signing becoming a part of UDAY. Odisha, because it has only private DISCOMs, does not significantly benefit though I think we could talk to them and have them come in for whatever benefit we can give even through the private DISCOMs for the people of the state to enjoy. Nagaland is probably in dialogue, and Mizoram and Nagaland are in dialogue, possibly, they will also join up, and not one of them under any pressure to join. The entire signing of UDAY – the joining, the agreements – are through a consensual approach, through a collaborative approach, to draw up the entire programme where there is no compulsion on both sides.

We have worked through an approach of cooperation, understanding the needs of the state, understanding what is good for the people of the state, what is in the interest of the people of the state, what is in national interest. And working through this approach of collaboration, we have been able to bring forth a mechanism, a framework, a series of measures, which I have full confidence and I can commit will change the entire scenario in the power sector. And I do hope that in the process, our effort to leave behind a better power sector, far better power sector than the one we inherited will be successful.

In fact, success is always the sum of small efforts. And through UDAY, we have not tried to say that we have done something which is earth-shattering or what most analysts like to call big bang. That’s not the effort at all. It’s the attention to small detail. It’s the attention to what can save even 5 crore and 10 crore for a DISCOM. And I personally believe, as does my team, that our success will come from a series of small initiatives, which put together will become a game changing revolution in the power sector.

In fact, Robert Collier had said, ‘success is the sum of small efforts repeated day in and day out.’ And that’s what monitoring of UDAY is all about. I remember when we first brought out UDAY and people were asking what’s different in this from the past amongst many things. And I think this is something which has never been attempted in the past in terms of the fact that without giving even a single rupee we have been able to voluntarily get all the states onboard to discipline themselves, enjoy the fruits of whatever the centre has to offer, work together with the centre, the states, the public sector undertakings and the private sector, and the consumer organizations to do good for their people, self-discipline themselves. We will self-discipline our own working through policy measures, through improvements in the framework, through ease of doing business, through transparency in all that we do. The public sector undertakings will try to handhold and help the states perform better.

And all of us together will stand accountable to the people of the nation. And an integral part of this UDAY, different from the past, I had said on many occasions, is our deep focus on monitoring and accountability. Today’s interaction, in some sense, is also a part of that effort to present a report card before you. The fact that we have put in so many mobile apps, and so much data is now available transparently for the media, for all of you, to keep a check on our work, to criticize us when we go wrong, to tell us where we could do something better, to guide and help us navigate this entire story more efficiently, more effectively, is a part where all of us can work together. The media, in fact, has an even bigger responsibility being the fourth pillar of democracy to keep the executive, to keep the political establishment, all of us in check. And I must share with you, on more occasion than one, some of the media reports have been like an eye-opener, have helped me do my job even better, helped me understand certain things I never knew about.

So this collaborative approach where all of us are working together as a team is to my mind going to be the hallmark of the success of UDAY. In fact, Prime Minister Modi had very aptly described it – Federalism is no longer the fault line of centre-state relations, but the definition of a new partnership of Team India. And it is in that spirit of partnership that UDAY was formulated. In fact, UDAY was formulated only through consensus, through discussions and I think over a thousand hours or maybe a few thousand hours of consultations with different stakeholders and people who knew better than me, certainly much better than me.

And, in that sense, this cooperation has helped us reach so far. We still have miles to go. We still have a lot to do. All of us are committed to meeting the expectations of the people of India. But we do believe that the success to any programme can only happen when there is a strategy in place. It’s very critical to have a conscious and planned strategy in place when you are trying to do some significant, game changing and impactful improvement in your work.

The famous futurist Alvin Toffler had once said, ‘if you do not develop a strategy of your own, you become part of someone else’s strategy, and you don’t know whether that strategy is really good for you.’ Which is why UDAY, in some sense, draws up a strategy where all stakeholders have protected their interest, what is in their interest and come up with a common framework, yet that common framework allows enough flexibility to tailor-make solutions to different states’ requirements. So it’s not a one-size-fits-all. It’s a broad framework within which each state is developing its own strategy, which we are trying to validate through examples, through experience, through what happens in other states. So there is a lot of experience-sharing amongst states when we have our Power Ministers’ Conference, when we have our monthly monitoring of what’s happening in the power sector through Secretaries and other officials of each state. So the monitoring is something which is not left to chance. It’s not left to an annual or a biannual or a bi-yearly exercise also. It’s a conscious monitoring, happening every month and within that month also happening day by day. And I myself have reviewed three states in the last 2 days.

Yesterday, I had an extensive review of Manipur, a state which has recently seen a change of government. Yesterday, I had a review with the honorable Power Minister, Manipur, of course, the Power Minister and the Chief Minister with all their officials came. Rajasthan Power Minister, and the officials of Rajasthan, including the Finance department officials, so our monitoring is not just between power sector and our power sector, or between Minister and Minister. I talked to the honorable Chief Minister at length on two occasions in the last three days. She deputed her Minister, officials, including officials from the finance department, we had an extensive review. In fact, I didn’t have lunch yesterday in that process.

Day before yesterday, we spent what? 3 and a half hours, almost 4 hours with the Power Minister, the new Power Minister of the new and dynamic government, and really sensitive government wanting to do something, I can say earth-shattering in Uttar Pradesh. The passion with which Yogi Adityanathji, the honorable Chief Minister of Uttar Pradesh has talked to me almost 6 times in the last one week or 8 days alone, and the number of times Shrikant Sharma, the new Energy Minister of Uttar Pradesh, has been on line with me followed with our meeting day before yesterday and two more conversations after that also.

And threadbare, every element of what can be done, what can be done to change the way things have happened in the past so that Uttar Pradesh, the people of Uttar Pradesh and those 1.8 crore nearly families, or 8-9 crore people of Uttar Pradesh who still don’t have electric connection can get benefit and quickly at that. So we are working to a strategy. We are working to a plan. We have a clear and visionary goal chartered out by the honorable Prime Minister. The team has drawn up the roadmap to achieve that vision and our mission. All the states, all the government companies, and if I may say, even the people of India are conspiring to help us achieve that goal.

And, I have said it before but I won’t once again borrow from Shah Rukh Khan on that famous dialogue, but clearly, and I have said it before, when you really desire something very passionately, when you want something to happen and you put your heart and blood and soul into it, then even the Universe conspires to help you make it happen. And that’s what this team sitting here, and some of them sitting here, and I think the people of India expect out of us, and which we are committed to deliver, which we are working day and night to deliver and we assure you will deliver. There’s no ifs and buts about it. We will deliver. We will make it happen. We will do it right. We will do it efficiently. We will do the right things at the right time and we will do it right.

Of course, today is also very interesting that three more states – Arunachal, Tripura and Kerala – have joined, which also will explain to you that this is something which cuts across political ideologies. It’s not a question of which party, which government rules in a particular state. Everybody wants to serve the people of India, their state, their area of influence. So I am really delighted that everybody is becoming a part of this mission. I am delighted to see your app, your portal. I do hope more and more states give you data, real time basis. Please handhold them and help them wherever they need any support to sanitize their data and give accurate data into the apps and websites. Because till we monitor and hold people accountable for the work that each one of us is supposed to do right from me downwards, I think we will never get success. Howsoever good our strategy may be, unless we monitor and we hold people accountable for it, even a beautiful strategy can fail.

So I am sure all the effort that all of you are doing, I am not getting into too details. I think the presentations were quite composite, quite comprehensive. The big picture is that we are trying to bring in efficiency into the entire value chain and we can’t expect the people of India to pay for the inefficiencies of the value chain. The effort through UDAY is to focus on setting things right, bringing in highest levels of efficiency and through that ensuring that everybody gets a chance to enjoy the fruits of development at an affordable price right through the life. And that we leave behind a framework which serves the nation for years and years to come and does not something which is a short term gain, but certainly becomes the engine or the fulcrum of the growth and development and a brighter future for the people of India.

I would like to thank REC and all the officials who have really worked to make UDAY a success. I would like to thank all the other ministries who have worked together with us, be it the Ministry of Coal, be it the Ministry of New and Renewable Energy, be it the Finance Ministry, Petroleum Ministry. It’s been an effort where everybody has chipped in – the Environment Ministry in a very big way. It’s been a collective effort of everybody working together to achieve a common goal. And I can assure you that we shall continue to work together in the spirit of cooperation, breaking the silos within ministries or departments, breaking the silos between the centre and the state, breaking the silos between the public sector and private sector. But working together with only one objective and that one and only one objective is to serve the people of India.

Thank you very much.

Q&A

Q. Sir, this is …. from Axis Capital. Could you highlight the progress on scrapping up the old plants and repowering them, and if you could address your question on the Carrot and the Stick approach, it will be very grateful?
A. We have already announced that NTPC is going to phase out 11,000 MW of their old plants and we are talking with the states to see how quickly some of them could also look at replacing. Yesterday I discussed with Rajasthan, for example, they are considering phasing out some of the old and inefficient plants. UP is thinking of phasing out, so we are in dialogue with all the states. But it certainly is a decision the state has a right to take.

Q. Sir, this is Amish from Bank of America Merrill Lynch. The coal swap reform that has been initiated by the government, the coal swap reform, that’s a brilliant reform but if you can share some experiences of any state that has shown some willingness to go for that, that will be really helpful?
A. Gujarat has been the one who has benefited the maximum because Prime Minister Modi has been talking of it right from the time he was Chief Minister. I think on file there must be tons of letters that he has been writing, but somehow that decision was not been taken in the past. But now several states are enjoying the benefit of that, Uttar Pradesh has also got some benefit of it and day before also they have asked for some more swaps. Gujarat has asked for one more swap, I forgot one more review meeting which happened on Sunday evening with the Gujarat Power Minister and the Power Secretary of Gujarat. So we have had four meetings in the last, today is what? Wednesday, so 4 days and 4 states I have reviewed in the last …

Q. Sir I particularly meant the swap of coal with power through the e-auction process that you have initiated recently?
A. No, discuss with the Coal Secretary, it’s not a macro issue. At lunch you can discuss.

Q. Sir this is Shukdeep Mitra from Real Financial, sir just wanted to understand that in every individual MoU on under UDAY, we have also had targets of tariff hikes which was supposed to be one of the lower bearing fruits. However on that front we have seen filings but, you know, any progress…
A. Well, first of all, I hope you are all aware that all the MoUs of UDAY are also available on the website. So there is nothing confidential. In the old days, it was all in our files and you had no clue what’s going to happen, now all of that is in public domain, point 1. Point 2 – the tariff increase is an indicative process, if they improve their efficiencies better then they may not need to increase the tariff. So tariff is not something that I can or they can decide bilaterally, it’s the regulator who decides the tariff and that I cannot take away from the regulator. But the commitment of the states in the MoU is that they will file their tariff petitions regularly. They have indicated what they expect the tariff rise to be, what they require the tariff rise to be. But then there are some states who have informed us they don’t need to tariff hike. They are able to do it better through efficiencies. So I think that’s a decision for the state and the DISCOM to make, should they not want to do a tariff hike but increase the subsidy out of their budget, they are free to do that, I have no problem with that.

So I am the last fellow to suggest to anybody to do a tariff hike. To my mind, we should now start looking at tariff reductions in this country and better efficiency to make up for the shortfall.

Q. Manish Goyal from Enam Holdings. Just a question on like, what we are observing is unwillingness of the states to sign the PPAs, like nearly 23,000 MW of capacities are stranded. So if you can please comment on that?
A. You know, there is no unwillingness on the part of the states to sign PPAs. They already have sufficient PPAs to meet their requirements. Sadly, in the past the planning of power capacity, viz-a-viz the demand turns out to be all either wrong or not even taken care of properly. We have, in fact, brought out a far more robust electricity demand statistic and data, which is available now through the CEA website which reflects what a more realistic demand pattern will be. And it also takes into account our thrust to energy efficiency. So we are trying to reduce the waste of energy. My next programme, and we are launching it in Uttar Pradesh soon, is going to be about energy efficient pump replacing the, you know, age-old 20-30-50 year old pumps, which our farmers are using which guzzle electricity and actually cost the nation dear. Which we should replace with modern energy efficient pumps, save that electricity, reduce the bill of the farmer, reduce the waste in the whole system.

So just because there is a additional capacity which came up in an unplanned manner or in an excess manner doesn’t mean that states have to necessarily sign PPAs. Having said that, with the Make in India programme getting thrust, with the IIPs showing improvement, with more and more people wanting to come and invest, FDI is at a record high. The honorable Finance Minister has recently mentioned some very significant steps that are being taken to resolve the NPAs in different sector. We are also looking at the NPAs in the power sector along with the banks to see what we can do to reduce the stress in the power sector. All of us are working together to see how we can give a further boost to manufacturing and demand in the country and then logically there will, obviously, be more PPAs coming in the marketplace.

Q. Sir, this is Abhishek Poori from Deutsche Bank, sir one question on the draft, the National Electricity Plan actually talks about the PLF of power plants going down from 60 to 48% by 2022, whereas we are looking at Make In India, the industrial growth etc.
A. I think he explained that PLF issue, you either missed that slide or you didn’t understand. Please talk to Mr Verma. And that 42% you are picking up one scenario, there are 50 scenarios in that.

Q. I think that’s the base case scenario that she has painted.
A. Yeah, you want to take the worst case, it’s your choice. Yeah, but you can choose to be a pessimist or an optimist. I am a born optimist. So I look at top of the line, you look at the bottom. You will see what happens, but I can assure you, I will be successful.

I hope I am not being rude. It’s just that I want to give my sense of optimism and confidence in my country and my people. And we will achieve not that 42 but we will achieve the 75% or whatever is the top of the line.

Thank You.

 

Ashwini Kumarji, my old friend who has been on the board of State Bank with me when in the good old days when I was there, good old days not in the sense that the today is any worse off. Other Directors of the board of SBI Caps, Mr Rain Sene, Mr Sharma, Mr Barmala, all the other senior dignitaries, ladies and gentlemen. Today is Gudi Padwa, it’s the New Year. We have all been in celebration mode. Of course, with a few caveats, the Rajya Sabha did not run today, but it’s been a great day of new beginnings. It’s a day of new tidings, it’s the New Year when we are looking forward to something better in the life of this nation. And I think it’s so appropriate that we have launched the Unnati Card on this auspicious day. My congratulations to State Bank, to SBI Cards, to all of you, and I wish SBI Cards and this new initiative of Unnati great success in the days ahead. And I am sure this will, hopefully, become one of those days where we see transformational change happening. And in the next few minutes I am going to be a little demanding and possibly make Mr Jasuja pay a tax for inviting me here today. But thank you very much for giving me this opportunity to be here. You expressed gratitude Jasujaji, पर मैं तो अपनों के बीच आया हूँ, gratitude किस बात का? शायद बोर्ड में नहीं हूँ लेकिन मैंने कभी स्टेट बैंक का दामन नहीं छोड़ा है |

And, in some sense, this excellent performance that we saw, the cultural performance before the formal programme, which in fact, was the formal programme, the Card really got unveiled with that lovely number. Reminded me of the good old days when we used to have a lot of focus on cultural performances or cultural evenings whenever we had our bank board meetings or any celebrations at the bank. And I was thinking to myself sitting there that over the years I think life has become so clinical and mechanical and so busy that we have completely forgotten enjoying music, enjoying dance, enjoying the finer things of life, which actually help create a true balance in life. And I must compliment all the young artists who presented both India’s rich cultural diversity and within that the unity and integrity of this country so beautifully. A big thank you to all those young artists for really reigniting that spirit in us again.

We are in the midst of a new India, an emerging India, a story which is unfolding every single day there are new things happening, there are new decisions being taken, a lot is happening in the country. And this thrust towards digital technology, towards moving out from a cash economy into a more formal economy, and then within the formal economy into an economy which transacts digitally, transacts through banking channels, has been one of the most important programmes of the government led by Prime Minister Shri Narendra Modi.

The demonetization exercise, now about four and a half months ago, has yielded very significant benefits to the economy. We can clearly see the moving away from the formal sector of large number of people who want to associate with the formal sector. And I am delighted that State Bank of India with its big infrastructure across the country played a very important role in the re-monetization exercise all through November, December and January. And I am delighted that today, we almost find business as usual across the country in every respect, and I would like to through you madam express our gratitude all the state bankers who have been a part of this exercise.

Of course, when I talk of business as usual, I don’t mean that we should go back to the bad old days of the informal economy. I do hope we will see that change that was the thrust and focus of the demonetization exercise yield good results, good fruit to the national economy. Honorable Finance, Minister Mr Jaitley, has talked about the new normal where he’s spoken about how more and more people in the country now want to be a part of the new way of doing business, engage with the formal economy, see the merits and benefits of the formal economy. And, ladies and gentlemen, the entire effort to unify the Indian marketplace through GST, the Goods and Services Tax, would not have been successful but for this effort to try and bring the entire business chain into the formal economy, because in the days of past, money used to move out from the formal economy to the informal economy and then back into the formal economy almost seamlessly. So you really didn’t know when the money that you spent on a transaction moved out of the formal economy and when it came back in, so you could be spending money innocuously in a restaurant or a dhaba, but you were not sure whether that would get accounted into the system. So you didn’t know whether your hard earned tax paid money is going to genuinely remain in the formal economy or would somewhere along the line move out. And you didn’t know when the informal economy or money which was outside the tax-paid set up would creep back into the formal sectors, probably, through purchase of some jewellery or…

There were so many transactions which were keeping out of the tax net that India as a whole was not able to look at lower tax rate, was not able to look at a much more robust revenue collection to serve the poor of India. And I think this entire effort – (a) demonetization, (b) capturing where this currency was over the last many years, particularly, with the growth in large currency notes over the last 10-12 years, which had been phenomenal. The capturing of that into the banking channels and the encouragement that is being sought to be given to everybody to participate in the formal economy, to my mind, there is no doubt that in the days ahead, the GDP of the country, the economy, is going to vastly benefit from more and more people coming into the tax net, from being a part of the formal economy, and seeing the merits of recording their transactions honestly.

In that, the step of State Bank of India to offer a new product, the Unnati Credit Card, to the people of India I think is one more effort to engage more and more people to transact digitally, to transact through the banking system. And I am sure, in the days to come, this will help SBI Cards also take a quantum leap forward. Mr Jasuja was just mentioning about the 300 million customers of State Bank of India, I think with the merger that’s closer to 400 million now. And with a 400 million customer base, even though a 100 million of them are possibly the Jan Dhan account holders, hopefully holding a Rupay Card, I fail to understand why SBI Cards should be resting on its laurels that you have 15% of India’s card base with 4.3 million customers. That is something which to my mind is totally unacceptable.

If I was in your shoes, I would be benchmarking from the figure of 300 million and working backwards why are 300 million customers not on the SBI Card network. And that is what I think you should start looking at. You have a natural customer base waiting to be tapped and here you are struggling with 4 million and numbers of that kind. You offered a new product today, and I was thinking in my mind that it’s a great idea – anybody with Rs 25,000 in his bank account being offered a card without a credit history, in fact, this card will help him to create a credit history. Great idea, undoubtedly a good idea! Then why should you restrict it only to the State Bank of India deposit of Rs 25,000? Can we not think laterally and look beyond that? If I was in your shoes, and State Bank is the banker to every Indian, is that the tagline? Is the bank of the nation! I know my own wife, when I left my active business life and got into the role of a Minister and had to quit from all my businesses or income earning. And now I have to live on my interest income, because on the salary of a Minister, शायद मेरा घर एक हफ्ते भी नहीं चलेगा |

But then, my wife categorically told me that put all the money into State Bank, कोई और बैंक में पैसा नहीं डालना | That’s the trust that you have in the people of India. Now for you, you should be looking at expanding your horizon. Can I tie up with the Provident Fund organisation? Every Provident Fund holder of an account would have a certain reasonable amount of balance. If you tie up with PF and say that everybody who has a PF account with, let’s say a redeemable value of Rs 10,000 or whatever, could be eligible for a card. Issue him a card straightaway. Everybody who has a deposit in any bank account of any branch, of any of the PSU banks or even a private bank, attract him to you. Tell him you give us your bank deposit or an FDR receipt, give us a lien on that, take a card. Tie up with all the PSUs, we have tons and tons of them. I have a million people working in the PSUs under me. Give those million people, their wives, their children, their uncle and aunt, if he is taking the guarantee; give all of them a card. You straightaway can expand maybe to 4-5 million more customers.

Think laterally, think beyond the confines of where we are today and get out of this concept of 10% growth and 20% growth and 50% growth. We should look at a quantum leap. And our effort should be can we look at a 300% growth next year? Can we look at a 500% growth next year? That should be the aim of this company and this bank. After all, Prime Minister Modi, when he says, ‘it’s time that India leads the world and not follow the world,’ he’s looking at that kind of a game changing dimension. Otherwise, at the speed at which we were working, we would have taken electricity to the last 5 crore people, rather 5 crore families which means about 22-23 crore people in the next 100 years, at the speed at which the programme was going on. But when he told me to do it in 6 years, he very clearly meant he needs action. He wants a scale up which has never been seen before. When we discussed energy efficiency, we didn’t rest on a plan which said, ok, till 2014, 600,000 LED bulbs were being sold every year, if we do even 1 million-2 million-5 million, I could have reported 500% growth. But that’s not what we were looking for. So from 600,000 bulbs a year, the Prime Minister said we have to do 770 million in 4 years. I don’t even know the maths, even my chartered accountancy fails me.

I would urge you to look in that respect. After all, why should India not have 100% of the people holding a card in their hand? Some may have a Rupay Card, some may have a Unnati Card, some could have a Platinum or a Gold or whatever other cards you all offer. And, we all know there will be some delinquency, in fact, the delinquency is more in SBI Caps from whatever I remember of those good old days or bad old days or whatever it was. Because, probably, we are not quick on the uptake. You try defaulting from an HDFC card or an ICICI card, वह तो घर पे पहुँच जाते हैं सीधा money lender की तरह |

I know we don’t want to be rude. We don’t want to be ruthless or any of that. But we should be faster on our response time, on our action time, on blocking the card, ensuring that our risks are limited to a certain value. And then the exchange of information within the bank, within the banking system, within other credit card issuers, if that exchange of information can be good, which is also the need of the hour in the banking sector. I mean we should not be allowing in today’s digital age that a person defaults in one bank, merrily goes to another bank, opens an account and starts transacting there, possibly also enjoying bank loans over there. That’s what CIBIL and all of that was meant to do. I think we can devise robust mechanisms in this age where India provides information technology support to the rest of the world, I am sure we can do better within the country.

After all, the whole concept of Jan Dhan, Aadhar and Mobile – the JAM concept – is meant to take India to the next level of digital engagement and ensure that there is that 360-degree control on what’s happening in a person’s business or in a person’s life to ensure that he doesn’t default, yet, gets the possibility of service as much as possible, as quickly as possible and as efficiently as possible. So Jasujaji I am sorry if I have given you some thoughts which are out of sync, but I think the next time I come to an SBI Cards programme, I would love to see this 4.3 million atleast 43 million.

And I promise you, this government doesn’t have the luxury of time. हमारे को कितना अब 2 साल बाकी हैं हमारे term में, अगले चुनाव में जीत तब होगी जब SBI Card के 43 million customers होंगे | क्योंकि फिर मैं अपनी उपलब्धियों में भी बोलूँगा कि देखो सरकारी बैंक ने क्रेडिट कार्ड दिया बिना कोई charges के 4 साल के लिए | So I think that’s a great offering that you are giving. I would, of course, urge SBI Cards also, and I remember when I was on the board of Bank of Baroda had started this effort और State Bank में भी था तब मेरी उस टाइम से यह मानना था और जब अभी demonetization के दिनों में digitalization पे थोडा बहुत मुझे काम करने का मौका मिला तब मैंने बार बार कहा था कि हमको POS machines पे focus करना चाहिए | Merchant acquisition is the key to the success of this programme, sadly, we have not put enough effort on merchant acquisition. We have made merchant acquisition – (a) very complicated, (b) very expensive. And in the last, during the demonetization period I think we had provided that for Rs 100 a month, we will ensure that people get a POS terminal.

I think if I was in your shoes, I would think differently. I would put an SBI POS terminal in every goddamn store, every thelewala, every hawker, all across the country. You have nothing to lose. There is only gain. There is no pain. And with today’s costs on a POS machine and I had even offered the help of EESL, my company, which is known to drive down prices of LED bulbs from Rs 310 to the last order was some Rs 40 or something. So there is lot of possibility if you think of scale, but get out of these 2 or 3 companies only will provide a POS machines, what is all that? Let’s get 50 startups to come and start providing POS machines through the length and breadth of this country. There should be a startup in every district in the country – 600-700 companies – which should be servicing these POS machines, should be setting it up, calibrating them, keeping records. And again, with this technology in this country today, everything can be, in fact, monitored offline. Through my mobile apps, I can tell you everything in my whole 4 Ministries, right up to this moment. You ask me any question, and we have the media, maybe they can ask me at the end of this programme. I will tell you whatever is happening in the whole country, right now, it’s real time. Your data should also be all real time. You could actually tell a fellow that go on to the, on a mobile app and enter you want to see a pharma shop where an SBI Card is accepted, and Google Earth can take you there right now, which is the nearest pharma shop, which accepts an SBI Card. You could, possibly, be doing the same thing for SBI Buddy.

After all, why should private sector companies have had an opportunity to become larger than SBI on a simple thing like Mobile Wallets? Why should SBI not use BHIM and take it to the length and breadth of the country and have 400 million of its customers using BHIM app. It’s very much doable. And, once you scale it up to that level, then your costs can come down significantly. Sadly, our whole thinking is, ki no RBI allows us to charge 1% of the transaction so we are going to charge 1%. Why can’t we think of scale? Why can’t we think that ok, if we are doing a 100 million transactions, can we do 20 billion and bring down that cost to maybe Rs 2-3 per transaction, फिर चाहे एक करोड़ रुपये की transaction हो, 2-3-5 रुपये से ज्यादा क्यों लगने चाहिए?

Encourage people to use your platforms and the volumes will drive down costs, even if you have to for a short period maybe forego some returns, but engagement, after all, where does value get created? आप जितने internet companies हैं, जितने यह e-commerce companies हैं, इनकी valuation देख लीजिये, they are all making huge losses. Your private sector Mobile Wallet company makes losses of upward of a 1000 crores every year, then where does the $5 billion value come from? I don’t think SBI Caps would have a $5 billion value. Why no? When you have a parent who is so bestowed with so much opportunity, you should be giving us a $5 billion/10 billion/20 billion value proposition, what you will do in the next 7 days, what you will do in the next 30 days, what you will do in the next 3 months, how we are going to create value?

By the way, EESL, the company which did the LED programme, we didn’t start with the programme alone, we started with the proposition when will it be a billion dollar company. It was a company which did a turnover of 35 crores two years ago and our target is how quickly can we make it a billion dollar company. It’s possible. The limitation is in our mind. The question is, as the Prime Minister once said, that nowadays the only status that matters is not whether you are awake or you are asleep, whether you are online or you are offline. And I think all of you need to choose, is SBI Cards going to be a company which is awake to the opportunities? Is SBI Cards a company which is going to grasp every opportunity? Is it going to be in an offline mode waiting for things to happen or is it going to be in an online mode moving the needle, working passionately, serving the people of India through the length and breadth of the country and cashing this huge base that you have available in house to capture market share, to capture market opportunities.

Are we going to be able to say that India today has a value proposition in BHIM app, very soon in the Aadhar-enabled payment system put together, to my mind, can actually drive out everybody else in the world from this business and make India the leader of the world, make the world use our apps and transact, make the world look at India and Indian technology as the safest, surest and most effective and efficient way to transact. The jury is out Mr Jasoja. The ball is in your court and your colleagues’ court. I will wait and watch.

Thank you.

 

 

Foreign dignitaries, diplomats, environmentalists, lawyers, all those young students right there at the back, ladies and gentlemen, I am carrying this mobile not because I am going to show you any of my apps, just to make sure I stick to my 7 minutes allotted to me. And my time starts now.

In some sense, it’s very appropriate that Justice Swatantra Kumarji regularly holds these discussions to come up with newer ideas and bring back the focus of all of us on this very sensitive and important subject. In fact, the other day, I heard someone say, imagine if trees gave off WiFi signals, how many trees we would have planted by now on this earth? Probably, we wouldn’t need to save the planet, that itself would have changed the way the world works. Too bad, they only produce oxygen which helps us breathe and live. But truly, we are living on this planet today as if we have another planet to go to later. And it’s time that the entire world recognizes that climate change, which is caused ultimately by humans, needs to be addressed and it’s only we humans who can address this challenge. Environmental pollution, degradation of natural resources ultimately cost society and the largest cost to society is caused to the poor of the country, to the vulnerable sections of society, lost incomes, ill health.

And, therefore, it’s very imperative, we as a nation conspire together to do something about this. In fact, it’s very appropriate that we executed the Paris Agreement on Mahatma Gandhi’s birth anniversary. Mahatma Gandhi, in fact, in 1911, had used the phrase ‘Economy of Nature’, and it brought out the deep sensitivity and understanding that Mahatma Gandhi had on this subject. He understood that we need to balance nature’s supply and the demand of human existence. He had once said, ‘earth provides enough to satisfy every man’s need but not every man’s greed.’ And I think that summarizes what conservation of nature, what sensitivity towards a better environment should mean to all of us.

In fact, in this government, over the last three years, we have tried to take a 360 degree holistic approach to matters of energy, to matters of environment and balancing the needs of energy on a growing economy with the commitment that this nation has to protect and save the environment and leave behind for the next generation a better world to live in, a better planet to be in. Because as Justice Swatantra Kumarji also often says, after all, we are all trustees on this planet, we have inherited this earth as trustees to leave behind for the next generation a better place to live in than the one we have inherited. We have tried to focus on energy conservation; a simple programme like the LED project where we are replacing all the lighting load of the country with LEDs will reduce carbon dioxide emissions by 80 million tonnes annually. While, of course, it’s economically a very prudent project. It saves the consumers Rs 40,000 crore in their electricity bills annually.

Similarly, when it comes to our energy generation, we are trying to move from a highly thermal power generation dependent economy more and more towards renewable energy. Our solar power programme, for example, has been scaled up from a 20 GW target by 2022 to a 100 GW target by 2022, and put together all the renewable energy sources along with the large hydro, which we still don’t categorize as renewable energy, India will have 225 GW of renewable and clean energy sources by 2022, not just a target but a target on which we are relentlessly working, pursuing religiously to achieve. And I can assure all the distinguished ladies and gentlemen here that all the commitments and contributions we promised at Paris will not only be met but will certainly be exceeded by this government, by the people of India, by the efforts of all of us in this room put together.

There are different plans on the mining sector to make mining more efficient and improve the environmental concerns of the areas where mines are producing. We are looking to process every litre of water that comes out of these mines so that we can provide clean drinking water to all the villages in those areas, so that we can rejuvenate our rivers with clean water, and also all the water discharged in the ground also is processed so that our soil quality does not get affected.

In the thermal power generating plants, we have mandated that if there is any waste water processing in a 50-degree radius around a thermal plant, they will compulsorily have to use the recycled waste water in the thermal generation so that the clean water can be available to serve the people of the cities of the towns in and around the thermal plants. And we have mandated that every bit of waste that is processed and electricity is generated will compulsorily be purchased by the state DISCOMs so that waste, which is a serious problem in the country, large amounts of food waste, large amounts of other waste that is generated in the country gets processed rather than going only to the landfills.

Before I conclude, I would like to share with you a passion that Prime Minister Modi has to convert our vehicles into electric vehicles in the country. All the honorable Judges, particularly, Justice Swatantra Kumarji has been very very concerned about huge element of pollution of our cities, particularly, due to vehicles because of use of petrol and diesel vehicles. The honorable Prime Minister has directed a group of senior Ministers to lead the initiative to convert and to make sure that come 2030, if not all, at least most of the vehicles that we use in this country are powered by electricity and the potential of moving all our vehicles into electric vehicles, ladies and gentlemen, is to reduce the consumption of petrol and diesel by about a $100 billion every year, saving us precious foreign exchange, saving us from dependence on import of petroleum products, and also reducing the pollution of our cities literally by 80 or 90% through conversion into electric vehicles.

In fact, one study Justice that we did showed that we can power the entire vehicular traffic, entire vehicles of this country in 2030, by using only 1% of the land area of Rajasthan, not also of the whole country, 1% of the land of Rajasthan if it generates solar power, can power all the vehicles of this country. And we are committed to try and make that programme, expand that programme rapidly across the country and serve the people in a manner which makes India proud. And India does not necessarily follow what the world does, but the world follows the lead that India takes.

In conclusion, may I quote from Steve Jobs when he said, ‘let’s go and invent tomorrow instead of worrying about what happened yesterday.’

Thank you very much.

Honorable Minister: But then for some political reasons at the last minute decided not to agree for UDAY. The Power for All, which was another major initiative of this government to ensure that by 2022, every home in this country gets connected with the power supply and gets 24/7 power, so when India turns 75, we didn’t want any child in the country, any young boy or girl to be deprived of this basic amenity of power. The entire country, every State, every Union Territory signed up on Power for All – 24/7, except Uttar Pradesh, one State in the whole country which had refused to agree for this.

But I am delighted to inform all of you that the honorable Chief Minister, Yogi Adityanath, a person who is very passionate about serving the people. I know that because for the last 3 years he’s been continuously engaging with me, talking to me, discussing with me how we can strengthen the power infrastructure in his area of Gorakhpur where he is a five-time elected Member of Parliament. And he has informed me that Uttar Pradesh would now like to be a part of this Power for All – 24/7 mission and take power to the nook and corner and every home in Uttar Pradesh.

Q: You raised the issue of DISCOMs. Most of the DISCOMs run in losses because of thefts and T&D losses are also very high. So, theft in some of the areas last year you pointed out that industrial houses and some of the big players also have a role to play. One, how are you curbing that? And, secondly, theft in certain pockets of certain cities where the enforcement agencies are scared to go, how would that be addressed?

A: Well, that’s true. There is a major problem about theft, about power theft. The AT&C losses in several States are extremely high, particularly, in States like Jammu & Kashmir, Uttar Pradesh, Jharkhand and Bihar. In fact, this was a problem that even Gujarat had once upon a time. When Prime Minister Modi was elected as the Chief Minister of Gujarat way back in 2001-02, at that time Gujarat Power Sector DISCOMs were also making huge losses. But then Chief Minister Narendra Modi was extremely firm in his resolve to solve this problem. Within the first year of his government, despite a lot of political pressure not to act, he filed almost 100,000 – 1 lakh FIRs against people who were indulging in theft. And I would like to share with you, more often than not this power theft is a phenomena which is done by the richer people, by industry, by people who are large consumers of power.

गरीब आदमी बेचारा 25 unit, 50 unit इस्तेमाल करता है वह क्या तो चोरी करेगा और क्या रिश्वत देगा लाइन्समैन को, I don’t think गरीब के ऊपर यह ज़िम्मेदारी या उसके ऊपर यह हम आरोप लगा सकते हैं | और शायद छोटा-मोटा कभी गरीब ने चोरी कर ली हो तो वह हालात के मारे कर सकता है, उसको बिजली नहीं मिलती हो या बिजली के बिल में तंग करते हों, लाइन्समैन कनेक्शन देने में रिश्वत मांगते हों | स्वाभाविक है ऐसे केस में कुछ दुर्भाग्य हो सकता है कि उसको कटिया मारना पड़े |

But the larger power theft comes from people who can actually afford it but are tempted to enjoy the fruits of stealing power. Prime Minister Modi within a year had come down strictly on power theft, was able to bring down power theft in Gujarat, and ever since, for the last 10-12 years, Gujarat has seen one of the finest DISCOMs, profit-making, serving the people of Gujarat 24/7 with quality power and affordable prices. I think more and more states are now realising the virtue of acting strictly against power theft. I am told the new young, energetic, Power Minister of Uttar Pradesh, Mr Shrikant Sharma, has also taken it upon himself that he will be cracking down on power theft. Yogi Adityanath ji, honorable CM, is committed to ensuring that the AT&C losses come down. I am very confident that more and more states will now start looking at, because ultimately, when 4 or 5 people steal power, it’s the 95 honest people sitting in this room who have to pay higher tariffs, who have to pay more for that power. So it’s very important that we all join in this effort wherever we see any instances of people who are not paying their bills honestly, I would urge all my young friends here to become whistleblowers, to become a part of this effort to stop power theft.

And just like in Munna Bhai, you had that, what was that, dadagiri or something? Gandhigiri! तो इस तरीके से हमको भी ऊर्जागिरी करनी पड़ेगी हम सबको मिलके |

Q: One of the, आप जब मिनिस्टर बने और आपको कोल् और पॉवर, दोनों का पोर्टफोलियो दिया गया उससे एक major जो advantage जो accrue हुआ वह यह था कि जो linkage थी वह improve हुई to the power plants. And recently, there is a new coal linkage policy – Shakti – which is being brought in. What is it all about?

A: Well, I think the policy is still under formulation. It’s still under finalization, so until the Cabinet approves it, we will wait for the final details. But as most of you are aware, this government has taken particular care that the natural resources or the wealth of this country which belongs to the people of India should not be given away to anybody without a due process, a transparent process and a process where everybody gets a fair chance to participate. We do not believe in discriminating between friend and foe. We do not believe that our MPs, our relatives, our friends have the right to the nation’s resources. We believe a transparent process-driven approach, a process-driven approach which allows everybody to participate honestly and fairly, generates revenue for the state, and that revenue then goes to serve the people of India. So you would have noticed that all the coal mines in so many, last three years, have been given away through a transparent auction process, some have been given to the states where since it’s the states, representing the people of India, we give it to them on allotment basis.

Similarly, the coal linkages, which in the past used to be given by a committee directly, we have done away with that. All coal linkages to the unregulated sector are now auctioned out, so everybody has a fair chance, the cements, steel, captive power units, everybody gets a fair chance to participate in that auction. And, similarly, now the power sector will also be given out coal linkages through a transparent process, which is being designed under Shakti.

Q: Simultaneously, recently there was a report by Sierra Club, Greenpeace and Coal …. on, this was a report about how India, China moving away from coal-based power and how many of the plants may ultimately lie idle. In case of India, it is said that in our case we may nearly have 3.2 lakh crore worth of investment in the coal sector, which may go underutilized probably.

A: Well, I can reassure everybody that coal plants are not shutting down. In fact, India’s dependence on coal will continue for several more years to come. Coal is a domestic raw material; we have it in abundance in India. And, I am sure all my young friends here will agree that India should be a domestic dependent economy, we should not depend on imports to run our power plants. And, therefore, coal, which is available in big measure all across the country, will continue to power our power plants or thermal plants. However, what we are doing is trying to bring in modern technology so that the consumption of coal is more efficient. We are insisting that all new projects should be super-critical projects. We are trying to replace old plants which are more than 25 years old with new and efficient plants so that consumption of coal is less and the pollution out of the power generation is reduced. We are looking at encouraging coal-to-gas, coal bed methane, different new technologies which will help to reduce pollution out of coal consumption. But, having said that, the base load without which no electricity system can survive, the base load in India will continue for many many years to come to be out of coal-based thermal power.

Q: Somehow our coal plants are not able to utilize more than 30% of domestic coal and we are primarily dependent on imported coal. How are we addressing this mismatch?

A: Well, I am glad you asked this question because this is the sad story of India’s mindset of the past vis-à-vis the mindset of today. We had coal shortages in the past. Everybody is aware that coal used to be a premium commodity and people used to struggle and very often even buy coal through the black market. And many people were dependent on import of coal despite having the third largest sources resource in the world in terms of our own domestic reserves. But that was because the government of the day in the past never had the confidence that we can increase our coal production to such an extent that all the coal that we require would be available domestically. After Prime Minister Modi took charge he encouraged all of us and the employees of the coal companies to ramp up production rapidly and I am happy to share with you that today India has surplus coal. We have no coal shortage. Whoever needs coal can get coal from the coal companies, and on the contrary, we have such huge stock of coal that we have had to regulate production of coal current year so that we don’t have the risk of too much coal in the coal mines in the pit yard.

But the past, when there were coal shortages, many power plants were set up based on technology which were not conducive to using domestic coal. Domestic coal has higher degree of fly ash and, therefore, these plants were set up in the period, let’s say, 2005 to 2014, and were planned during that period based on imported coal. Because of which even if these plants we want to give them more domestic coal, they are unable to switch over to domestic coal and country continues to import coal while we have surplus coal in the country. It’s a technological problem because of the mindset of that time, which never imagined that India could become a coal-surplus country.

Q: To address our growing energy needs, obviously, you are looking at foreign investment. And, recently, after Posco indicated that it might pull out of its old Odisha project and which is a big project worth nearly $12 billion. And prior to that, we had seen Arcelor Mittal pulling out. So you had said that there are more and more opportunities in India, and if one company chooses to pull out, the others will come in.

A: Well, I think everybody is aware that in the last 3 years, India has seen record Foreign Direct Investment. FDI inflows are at a record high for the last three years and we have seen a lot of interests in investing in India. In fact, a large market that India provides more than a billion aspiring Indians looking for a better quality of life, looking for homes, looking for clean water, looking for electric supply, looking for quality education, looking for employment opportunities. This is the place which is attracting investment from around the world and large number of international investors are making a beeline to come and invest in India.

It’s unfortunate that some companies chose not to pursue their investments here. And I think this is a legacy this government inherited. Posco, for instance, has been struggling for the last 12-13 years maybe, trying to get their environmental approvals, the land in place and other enabling infrastructure. After this government came in, we did speed up the process but I think by that time they had almost given up. So it’s very unfortunate that some companies are choosing to pull out despite a very investor-friendly government in place at the centre today. I do hope the states also will take this pro-active investor friendly approach forward, and together, we can both retain the old investors and encourage new investors to come to India.

Yet if some company chooses to go out, I think we will have to look at newer companies coming in, newer investors coming in. We can’t cry over spilt milk. We have to be positive. We have to look forward with a positive approach.

Q: You are also the Minister for the Renewable Energy, and solar power happens to be a big priority for you. Now, over here when it comes to solar power your targets are huge, but when we look at electricity supply, in that it is always a mix of energy from different sources and solar energy is a, it’s dependent on weather elements to a great deal and it takes a lot to balance it with the other regular power supply. So how do you look at that?

A: Well, solar power is not only about clean energy, because renewable energy helps us to reduce the level of pollution in the environment. But it’s also about India’s energy security. Because nobody can ever take away the sun from us, the sun will always be there. We could have a crisis or a problem about any other element but the sun will always be there. And, therefore, this government is encouraging solar power in a big way. I am delighted to share with the esteemed audience here that when this government was sworn in on 26^th May, 2014, India had a solar power base of 2,650 MW. On 10^th March, just last week, India crossed 10,000 MW, nearly four times.

When we came into government, India’s National Solar Mission was about expanding our solar base to 20,000 MW by 2022. Prime Minister Modi said this is not good enough, India should be at the vanguard, at the forefront of the solar revolution in the world. We decided we will scale it up by 2022, not to 20,000 MW only but to 1 lakh MW – 5 times more. So effectively, we would be increasing the solar capacity of India by 40 times in a span of about 7 or 8 years. And we are working day and night to make that happen.

Solar power will be an important element powering our electricity infrastructure. Its share of installed capacity, including other renewable sources like wind energy, bio-mass, bio-gas, small hydro, is expected to grow up to 1,75,000 MW by 2022, when India turns 75, which will be roughly 40% of India’s installed capacity. And while in Paris, we have committed that by 2030, India will have an installed power base of 40% renewable energy. My own sense is we will achieve that much earlier, and by 2030, India could possibly even cross 50% of its installed capacity coming out of renewable energy.

Of course, there are challenges and there are issues associated with that. You mentioned about grid balancing and absorbing large amounts of power from renewable sources which is not continuous. The solar power goes up during the day, comes down in the afternoon, wind energy comes at different times of the day. So certainly, this is infirm power. It doesn’t have a standard trajectory. But that is where India’s technological strength comes in, our planners, the grid planners and grid managers have already drawn up a plan how we will absorb such large amount of renewable energy. And I can assure you that at no point of time India will fail to be ahead of the curve to be able to absorb this large amount of renewable power.

Q: Is electricity storage also a part of it because so far nobody, there’s only been one major project of 10 MW in which solar power, in which power has actually been stored for over 4 hours. So is electricity storage some part of it because that helps balance the supply as well?

A: I think electricity storage is the future. We are still getting there. Of course, battery prices have fallen significantly in the last decade or so, almost by 70%. But we are still quite expensive in terms of battery storage and the viability of that, particularly, for a country like India where affordability of power is very important, has yet to be achieved. So it will take us a few more years before we can really look at storage becoming the grid balancer. Till that time we are looking at how gas-based plants can be reignited and helped to restart despite non-availability of gas in India to act as a grid balancer, as a spinning reserve. We are looking at pump storage, the hydro plants. We are also examining if we could promote electric vehicles in the country which will provide a natural storage through the batteries that will be used in the electric vehicles.

So we are continuously engaging with experts, both in India and internationally, to see how we can ensure better balancing of the grid and proper quality power reaching the people.

Q: To push the use of LEDs in the country as a source of power conservation, the government had stepped in. They had provided subsidies; they had resorted to distribution of bulbs. In power storage for promoting batteries and technologies related to batteries, is the government stepping in somewhere?

A: Well, the LED certainly has been a very successful experiment and, before I come to the battery I would like to share with all of you. Just the changeover from our incandescent bulbs to LED bulbs is already saving the people of India nearly Rs 20,000 crore per year of electricity bills, which benefit I hope all of you are also enjoying if your lighting at home or office is not yet LED, I would urge you to move to LEDs. Because by the time India changes all our lighting load with LEDs, India would actually be saving Rs 40,000 crore in electricity bills annually, just by this switchover.

In battery storage, we are working on a twin track. There are some pilot projects which we have initiated to test out what an impact it could have, we are also looking at certain areas where battery storage could play a role. For example, at the border areas, we could possibly see battery areas helping us to provide grid security, rather than diesel or petrol-based generating plants. We are also looking at the islands like Andaman and Nicobar islands, where we believe we can green those islands with a mix of hydro power, solar energy, wind energy and battery storage as a backup. But we are still a long way away from really pushing the needle on battery storage.

Q: Solar power and wind power, they both require large land parcels. How are you addressing land and environmental concerns related to these?

A: Well, solar power today needs about 5 acres per megawatt, which is certainly a lot of land. But I think that’s not a challenge for a country like India, in fact, it’s a great opportunity and I will explain how. There are large parts of the country, large tracts of land which are barren land, which are desert land where we don’t have any agriculture or any plantations. Now these barren lands actually don’t earn any income for the owners of these lands. So you have a large part of land in Barmer, for example, in Rajasthan, where the people who own those lands have actually no income. Solar provides them an avenue, an opportunity to make money, to earn money. And, in that sense, solar can be converted into a great opportunity to help generate power, give an income to those land owners, as well as provide clean and renewable energy for the nation.

Q: One, whenever we have elections in the country, a lot of people campaign on the premise of providing free or subsidized power to the farmers. How good a policy is this?

A: I have no problem if state governments are willing to subsidise and give cheaper or even free power to the farmers. You are well aware that the farmers of India are under a lot of stress. They have small land holdings. The output out of the farms is low, large parts of the farmlands in India are still dependent on vagaries of nature, so if you have the Al Nino effect, or drought or any flood happening, they will lose out on their income from farming. So farming in India, particularly, small and marginal farmers even today face a lot of stress and, therefore, giving them subsidized or low-cost or even free power is not a bad idea per se. But the state should ensure that the DISCOM also works efficiently and the power is not wasted. They should ensure that the subsidy is provided through the state budget or is cross-subsidized through the power bills of the larger or the richer consumers or of industry. And if they maintain the balance such that the DISCOM per se does not start losing money, I think it’s not a bad idea to serve the poor of India or the farmers of India with low-cost power.

Q: Finally, the last question from me. After Fukushima, a lot of concerns have been raised about nuclear power on which like entire Europe, North America and all have been dependent for so many years. And which in a way is also safe in some sense and, but when you have a disaster it’s always a major disaster. How is India looking at nuclear power as a future?

A: India has a progressive mind about nuclear power. We believe it is a clean source of power. It is an efficient source of power. Yet, at no point of time will we compromise with the safety and security of the people of India. So we are ensuring that the best of technologies come into the country. We are ensuring that whatever plants are designed and planned for India should be of the most, latest vintage, the latest technologies and any expansion on nuclear power will only be done keeping the best interests of the people of India, their safety and security and the overall geo-political and energy security of the country being kept in mind when any decisions are taken on the nuclear power sector.

Q: Thank you Mr Goyal, we would now like to throw the floor open for questions from…….
I had a lot of questions from the crowd and most of them already been addressed, I have just got one simple question which stays persistent and has been asked in the past as well. Probably, it is going to be a very monotonous question for you but a very simple one. So, there are these two farmers and they are asking us, or they are asking for an assurance that when can I have electricity to my village. So, this is a gentleman from Uttar Pradesh and he is asking us that by when can I have electricity to my village?

A: Well, as per the records submitted by the state government, there are only about a 100 odd villages in Uttar Pradesh where electricity has not reached. But that does not mean every farmer has got electricity as yet because there are a number of habitations जिसको हम मजला, टोला, धानी बोलते हैं | The revenue village does have electricity but it has yet to reach the habitations around the village. Also, large parts of Uttar Pradesh, you will be amazed, there are nearly 1.8 crore families, which means even if you look at the young boys and girls who are studying you could possibly have 4 crore students in Uttar Pradesh who are deprived of a simple thing like electricity. There are many farmers who don’t have electricity as yet.

The honorable Chief Minister has already contacted me three days back, he’s already had a basic framework discussion and I can reassure all the assembled friends here that Prime Minister Modi had made a commitment about new India. He had made a commitment that India will have a shelter on every citizen on this country, electricity, clean water, good schooling, good healthcare, sanitation in his home by 2022 when India turns 75. And I can assure all of you that that commitment is something we are all absolutely committed to and will achieve without any doubt.

Q: सर, यह हमारे युवाओं के बीच से आप के लिए यह सवाल आया है, सवाल तो कई हैं लेकिन समय की पाबन्दी की वजह से यह अंतिम सवाल हम ले रहे हैं आपसे कि T&D losses, Transmission and Distribution losses के बारे में आपने बताया कि किस तरीके से सरकार उसपे काबू पा रही है, गुजरात का उदाहरण भी आपने दिया | Overhead wiring से कब भारत को निजात मिलेगी, मुक्ति मिलेगी?

A: बहुत अच्छा प्रश्न है, उलटे by coincidence, कल ही इस विषय पे हमारे अधिकारियों के साथ मैं बैठा था | वास्तव में मैंने वाराणसी में एक पायलट प्रोजेक्ट शुरू किया है जिसमें कुछ 16 ward वाराणसी के लेके हम उसमें underground wiring कर रहे हैं | और एकदम चित्र ही बदल जाता है, उस शहर का चित्र एकदम नया सा शहर दिखता है जैसे ही वह लाइनें सब निकल के underground होती हैं, बिजली एकदम proper 24 घंटे मिलती है, कोई outage नहीं होता है | तो जीवन परिवर्तन करने वाला यह move है | यह इसपे investment, निवेश बहुत बड़ा लगेगा, आज देशभर में अगर सिर्फ शहरों में यह हम करने जाते हैं overhead को replace करके underground cabling, तो लगभग 20 लाख करोड़ रुपये का इसमें हमें निवेश करना पड़ेगा जो आज के भारत की आर्थिक स्थिति के हिसाब से मैं समझता हूँ कुछ समय लगेगा इसको अचीव करने के लिए | फिर भी हम केंद्र सरकार से कुछ योजनाएँ बनाने की कोशिश कर रहे हैं कि जो समृद्ध राज्य हैं कम से कम उन राज्यों में शुरू बड़े शहरों से करके अहिस्ते अहिस्ते इस विषय को बढ़ाया जाये | और जैसे मैं मुंबई से आता हूँ, मुंबई में लगभग सभी जगह underground cabling है तो उसका जो स्वाद है, उसका जो लाभ है लोगों को कि 24 घंटे बिना किसी interruption के बिजली मिलती है वैसा लाभ हमारे देश में और जगाओं पे मिले इसके लिए हम अब प्रयत्न शुरू करेंगे पर यह एक थोडा लम्बा समय का प्रोजेक्ट है |

 

 

 

 

 

Q: सबसे पहले पियूष जी आपका बहुत बहुत धन्यवाद कि आप ISOMES में यहाँ पर students से बात करने के लिए आये, आपने उनका मान-सम्मान रखा, उनके लिए आप एक प्रेरणा के श्रोत हैं | तो मुझे लगता है कि दो शब्द आपको बच्चों के लिए ज़रूर कहना चाहिए |

A: बहुत बहुत धन्यवाद अनुराधा जी, आप सबका बहुत बहुत अभिनन्दन, आज आप में से कई विद्यार्थी graduate किये हैं, मुझे पता चला अभी अभी Convocation हुआ है, तो आप सबको अपनी degrees मिली हैं | बहुत बहुत बधाई और बहुत बहुत शुभकामनाएं आगे आपके जीवन के लिए | मुझे बड़ा आनंद आ रहा है आप सबको मिल के और मैं समझता हूँ आज मैं स्वभाग्यशाली हूँ इसके पहले भी मेरा एक कार्यक्रम Young Indians का था, CII के Young Indians के Convention में और अब अनुराधा जी के माध्यम से आप सबसे मिलने का मौका मिला, बहुत बहुत आभारी हूँ आपका और Institute of Mass Communication जो आप चला रहे हैं उसके लिए आपको बधाई दूंगा क्योंकि वास्तव में अच्छी शिक्षा मिले, अच्छा कौशल विकास हो और training के साथ आगे के भविष्य के journalists बनते हैं तो मैं समझता हूँ ज़िम्मेदार reporting होगी, ज़िम्मेदार तरीके से विषय जनता तक पहुंचेंगे, सच्चाई जनता तक पहुंचेगी, और जो आपके ऊपर दायित्व है मीडिया के भाईयों बहनों पर कि देश में अच्छी तरीके से व्यवस्था चले, ईमानदारी से व्यवस्था चले और जहाँ जहाँ कमियां हैं उसकी आलोचना भी होनी चाहिए, जहाँ जहाँ कुछ अच्छा काम हो उसकी सराहना भी होनी चाहिए, इस प्रकार का एक balanced reporting अगर देश में होता है तो उससे आज की सरकार, आज का विपक्ष और अलग अलग संस्थाएं चाहे वह देश की Institutions हों, Elections Commission, Judiciary, Competition Commission जो institutions देश की पूरी व्यवस्था को सँभालते हैं चाहे वह उद्योग जगत हो, चाहे वह पुलिस या bureaucracy हो, चाहे वह राजनीतिज्ञ हो, सरकार हो, विपक्ष हो, हम सबके ऊपर एक निगरानी रखने का दायित्व जनता ने मीडिया के ऊपर दिया है | मीडिया का बहुत important role है देश की पूरी व्यवस्था को संतुलन में रखने का और मीडिया का उतना ही बड़ा role है कि जब अच्छे काम होते हैं उसको भी जनता में प्रेरणा देने के लिए और बड़े रूप में फैलाएं, और बड़े रूप में जनता को अवगत कराएं अच्छे चीज़ों से |

तो मैं समझता हूँ आप सबके ऊपर जो ज़िम्मेदारी है, ISOMES की इस अच्छी शिक्षा से आप सबके कन्धों पे आई है एक ज़िम्मेदार reporter बनने की, एक ज़िम्मेदार journalist बनने की और आगे भविष्य में कैसा एक अच्छा देश का निर्माण हो, कैसे भारत और एक अच्छी व्यवस्था के रूप में चले और देश की जनता की सेवा हो | इस ज़िम्मेदारी को सही मायने में आपके कन्धों में अनुराधा जी और ISOMES ने दिया है और मुझे पूरा विश्वास है जो आपको शिक्षा मिली है ISOMES से उस शिक्षा को पालन करते हुए, इस्तेमाल करते हुए आप एक अच्छे journalist, अच्छे reporter, अच्छी एक media personality बनेंगे, इसका मुझे पूरा विश्वास है, आप सबको बहुत बहुत शुभकामनाएं |

Q: पियूष जी thank you, thank you for speaking such good words for our students. I am sure आपसे वह प्रेरणा लेके बहुत कुछ सीखेंगे और ज़िन्दगी में आपकी तरह आगे बढ़ने की कोशिश करेंगे | पियूष जी बहुत सारी बातें हो रही हैं आजकल suddenly New India की बारे में, यह New India क्या है ज़रा इसको थोडा सा explain करें, क्योंकि New India के बारे में लोग New India, New India सुन तो रहे हैं, लेकिन क्या है यह?

A: देखिए भारत में एक दिशा के हिसाब से हमने 70 वर्ष पूरे देश की प्रगति हुई है, प्रगति के अलग अलग मापदंड लगाये जा सकते हैं, कोई कहेगा कम हुई है, कोई कहेगा ज्यादा हुई है | लेकिन इतना तो हम सब मानेंगे कि पर्याप्त नहीं हुई है | जितनी इस देश की आशाएं थीं, आकांक्षाएं थी जितनी ज़रूरतें हैं एक 120 करोड़ की जनता को जिस जिस प्रकार का एक भविष्य की उम्मीद थी वह देने में आज हमारा देश असफल रहा है | इसका यह मतलब नहीं कि हम निराश होके बैठ जायें इससे हमें प्रेरणा लेनी है कि एक अच्छा भविष्य देश के 120 करोड़ लोगों को मिले, एक आत्मविश्वास से यह देश आगे जाये, यह देश आत्मनिर्भर बने और जो लक्ष्य New India के साथ प्रधानमंत्री जी ने जोड़ा है कि 2022, 15 अगस्त 2022, जब भारत की आज़ादी के 75 वर्ष पूरे होंगे, उस वर्ष तक हम एक ऐसे देश की कल्पना करें जिस देश में हर व्यक्ति के सर पर छत होगी, उसका अच्छा मकान होगा, उस मकान में 24 घंटे बिजली होगी, उस मकान में शौचालय की सुविधा होगी, एक सड़क पहुंचेगी उस मकान तक, पेयजल, अच्छा शुद्ध पेयजल मिलेगा और स्वास्थ्य और शिक्षा की अच्छी सुविधाएं हर नागरिक को भारत में मिले | ऐसे भारत की कल्पना प्रधानमंत्री मोदी जी ने देश के समक्ष रखी है | हम सबको उन्होंने एक अपना vision प्रस्तुत किया है कि इस vision के हिसाब से हम सब काम करें |

यह बात नहीं है कि प्रधानमंत्री जी हम से बहुत काम कराते हैं, प्रधानमंत्री जी ने एक मौका दिया है हम सबको कि हम इस लक्ष्य को प्राप्त करने के लिए हम भी उसमें अपना योगदान दे सकें | और मैं तो अपने आपको सौभाग्यशाली  मानता हूँ और वास्तव में आप सब भी सौभाग्यशाली हैं कि जब भारत तेज़ी से प्रगति करे उसमें आप सबका भी योगदान होगा, आप भी इस पूरे journey में हमारे साथ रहेंगे, हमारी आलोचना भी करेंगे, सराहना भी करेंगे, अच्छा-बुरा जनता तक पहुंचाएंगे, नयी नयी योजनाओं के साथ जनता को जोड़ेंगे | तो मैं समझता हूँ यह पूरे जो युवा पीढ़ी का जो उत्साह है उस उत्साह को एक vision दी है प्रधानमंत्री जी ने New India से जोर के |

Q: पियूष जी suddenly आजकल 2022 की बात होने लगी है, लोग कह रहे हैं 2022-2022, तो मैं यह समझने की कोशिश कर रही हूँ तो क्या अब मान लिया जाए कि आप लोगों ने मान लिया है कि 2019 का चुनाव आप ही जीत रहे हैं?

A: देखिए हर चुनाव अपने आप में महत्वपूर्ण होता है और हर चुनाव को हम एक चुनौती भी मानते हैं और हर चुनाव में हम पूरी ताक़त और जोर से लड़ते हैं जीतने के लिए | हम समझते हैं कि हमारा एक दायित्व है कि चुनाव को जनता के पास एक रिपोर्ट कार्ड भी लेके जायें और जनता के पास अपना विज़न भी लेके जायें | तो ऐसा मैं आपको पूरा विश्वास दिलाता हूँ हम complacent नहीं हैं, हम कोई ऐसे बैठ नहीं गए हैं कि बस 2019 तो हम जीत गए हैं, लगातार यह सरकार काम में लगी रहती है | और आपको जानके ख़ुशी होगी 6 तारीख को वाराणसी में हमारा campaign ख़त्म हुआ, 3.30 बजे की flight लेके वहां से हम दिल्ली आये, 6 बजे कैबिनेट ली, कैबिनेट में बहुत महत्वपूर्ण निर्णय लिए गए और उसके बाद late रात तक जो backlog था काम का, फैलें जो निर्णय लेने थे उसमें हम सब मंत्री जुड़े हुए थे | तो हमारे हिसाब से तो काम कभी ख़त्म नहीं होता है, चौबीसों घंटे काम करने का हमारे ऊपर दायित्व है और 2019 के हमारे अलग लक्ष्य हैं, 2019 तक क्या क्या करना है उसके लिए हमने अलग मापदंड बनाये हैं | लेकिन एक व्यापक विज़न जो आगे की होती है वह विज़न short term नहीं होती है, वह short term एक कुछ कल्पना होती है, medium term लक्ष्य होता है और long term मिशन होता है | तो हम तीनों के ऊपर काम कर रहे हैं, 2019 तक भी इस देश में किस प्रकार से देश की जनता की आकांक्षाओं को कितना पूरा कर सकेंगे उसपे भी हमारा पूरा ध्यान आकर्षित है |

आज देश में बिजली की कोई कमी नहीं है | यूपी में हम चाहते हैं कि हर एक के घर तक बिजली पहुंचे, यूपी में हम चाहते हैं कि नॉएडा में भी चौबीस घंटे बिजली मिले | ऐसे हमारे पास बहुत सारे काम करने को हैं और उस काम में हम निरंतर लगे हुए हैं |

Q: मोदी जी ने यह भी बात कही कि middle class जो है वह बहुत stress में है, उसका stress कम करना है, middle class हमारे यहाँ का जो है वही जो है वह देश की जिसे कह सकते हैं धड़कन है, उस धड़कन की stress ख़त्म करने के लिए आप लोगों ने अपने लिए और पियूष गोयल ने अपने लिए personally क्या target रखा है कि middle class की मैं यह problem को कैसे solve करूं?

A: देखिए हर एक वर्ग की अपनी अपनी समस्याएं हैं | मैं समझता हूँ जो गरीब है उसकी अपनी समस्याएं हैं, जिसके प्रति हमें संवेदनाशील होना है, जिसकी पूर्ति करने का भी हमारे ऊपर दायित्व है | मध्यम वर्ग की एक अलग प्रकार की समस्याएं होती हैं, उन्होंने अपने जीवन में एक स्थान प्राप्त किया है लेकिन उस स्थान के हिसाब से क्या शिक्षा प्राप्त कर पा रहे हैं उनके बच्चे? क्या उस स्थान के हिसाब से उनके घर में चौबीस घंटे बिजली आ पा रही है? वैसे transport की क्या facilities है, law and order की क्या स्थिति है, आखिर law and order सबसे ज्यादा अगर किसी को तकलीफ देता है, गुंडाराज सबसे ज्यादा किसी को तकलीफ देता है तो वह मध्यम वर्ग को और गरीब वर्ग को देता है | तो मुझे लगता है कि हर एक वर्ग की अलग अलग समस्याएं होती हैं, अगर आप मध्यम वर्ग के साथ मेरे काम को जोडें तो दो-तीन प्रमुख विषय एकदम सीधे सामने आते हैं, एक तो बिजली की समस्या है | आज भी मध्यम वर्ग के कई परिवार हैं जिनको या तो बिजली पहुंची नहीं है या बिजली पहुंची है तो चौबीस घंटे बिजली का स्वाद नहीं है |

आज बिजली कोई luxury नहीं है, बिजली तो एक आवश्यक चीज़ है, हर एक को उसका अधिकार है, हर एक को बिजली मिलनी चाहिए | तो मैं समझता हूँ मेरा कोई बहुत बड़ा देन नहीं है, यह मेरे ऊपर दायित्व है, यह मेरी ज़िम्मेदारी है कि मैं हर घर तक बिजली पहुँचाऊँ, हर घर को चौबीस घंटे affordable और quality बिजली मिले जो बार बार ना जाये | तो उसके लिए जो पूरा विद्युतीकरण का infrastructure है वह सुधार करना पड़ेगा, अलग अलग आंकलन हुए हैं कि जब वह बिजली का सुधार करने जायें तो लगभग 15 से 20 लाख करोड़ रुपये इस देश में खर्चा करना पड़ेगा, वह पैसा कहाँ से आएगा? कैसे investment होगा? कैसे लोगों को कम से कम बोझे में ज्यादा से ज्यादा सुविधाएं मिल सकें | तो बिजली की एक बहुत सीधी मेरे ऊपर दायित्व है middle class को serve करने की |

साथ ही साथ पर्यावरण संभालना इसमें भी मेरा योगदान है, कैसे नवीकरणीय ऊर्जा, renewable energy को में प्रोत्साहन दूं, नवीकरणीय ऊर्जा से देश में प्रदूषण कम होगा, साफ़-सुथरी बिजली मिलेगी, ऊर्जा सुरक्षा बढ़ेगी देश की कि इस भविष्य की जो जनता का आगे का भविष्य है उसमें उनको ऊर्जा 100% मिलती रहे, साफ़-सुथरी ऊर्जा मिले और कम दाम पे मिले इसके लिए ऊर्जा सुरक्षा भी important है | और रोज़गार के नए अवसर पैदा हों जो विद्युतीकरण, mining, खनन के क्षेत्र में, इन सब क्षेत्रों के माध्यम से नए रोज़गार, self-employment, entrepreneurship, उघमी create हों, इस सबके रोज़गार पैदा हों | तो मैं समझता हूँ अलग अलग तरीके से हम सब इस नयी पीढ़ी के साथ, मध्यम वर्ग के साथ जुड़ सकें |

Q: पियूष जी आप लोगों ने यूपी में जो किया वह बहुत प्रचंड बहुमत से आपने किया है, सब कुछ तो किया लेकिन यह बताइये कि योगीजी को कहाँ से निकाल के ले आये आप लोग, suddenly जो है योगीजी कैसे मुख्यमंत्री बन गए?

A: नहीं योगीजी suddenly नहीं बने हैं, योगीजी हमारे बहुत प्रमुख नेता हैं उत्तर प्रदेश के, महाराज जी पांच बार सांसद चुनके आये हैं, 5^th term MP. इतने लोकप्रिय हैं उनके एरिया में, मैं आपको एक उदाहरण बताना चाहूँगा, गोरखपुर में जो fertilizer plant वर्षों से बंद पड़ा था उसके लिए वह निरंतर प्रयास करते थे कि वह शुरू हो | केंद्र सरकार ने उनके सुझाव को स्वीकार करके गोरखपुर के कारखाने का स्वीकृति दी है और उसको हम पुनः start करने जा रहे हैं नयी technology के माध्यम से, नए equipment से तो जब उस कार्यक्रम के लिए गया था तो मैं गोरखपुर मठ में भी गया हूँ देखने किस प्रकार का काम होता है | तो मेरे जो वाहन चालक थे, car driver थे, वह एक मुसलमान भाई थे और हम वहां पहुंचे, गाड़ी पार्क हुई, तो जो porch था, porch में गाडी park हुई, तो स्वाभाविक है driver right hand side पे था, gate पे entrance पे सीढ़ियों थी और सीढ़ियों पे महाराज जी खड़े थे और मैं left hand side पीछे बैठा था | तो उतर के जब तक मैं वहां पहुंचूं उसके पहले driver ने अपना दरवाज़ा खोल के तुरंत योगीजी का आशीर्वाद लेने वह वहां पे उनके पास चला गया|

मैंने देखा मैं actually बड़ा आश्चर्यजनक भी हुआ पर खैर तब तक मैं पहुँच गया, फिर योगीजी से मैंने आशीर्वाद लिए, अन्दर गया उन्होंने भोजन वगैरा करवाया, मंदिर में दर्शन करवाए | मेरी पत्नी का उपवास था तो उनके लिए फल और चाय मंगवाई | और उस सबके बाद जब मैं गाडी में वापिस आया तो मैंने first thing, गाडी शुरू होते ही मैंने ड्राइवर को पूछा कि भाई आप क्यों सीधा उतर के मेरे पहले गए उनके पांव छूने, बोले क्या बात कर रहे हो साहब मेरा तो आज स्वभाग्य है कि आपके कारण मेरे महाराज जी के दर्शन हो गए | और immediate, spontaneous उनका reaction था, तो यह पत्रकारों को शायद उनका एक क्योंकि वह …. कपडे पहनते हैं उनको आप एक रूप दिखता होगा | पर वास्तव स्थिति यह है कि उनके जो आश्रम का काम है उसमें हर वर्ग के लोग, समाज के हर वर्ग के लोग, जाति धर्म का कभी वह भेदभाव नहीं करते हैं | और विकास से इतने जुड़े रहते हैं कि आज सुबह भी मुझे उनका फ़ोन आया, विद्युतीकरण की चिंता कर रहे थे | आज सुबह मुझे पूछ रहे थे कि नए ऊर्जा मंत्री से आपकी चर्चा हुई क्या, मैंने कुछ उनको दिशा निर्देश दिया है |

मुझे बता रहे थे कि पियूष जी आप कब आ रहे हो लखनऊ, मुझे Power for All document sign करना है और मेरे प्रदेश में हर घर को चौबीसों घंटे बिजली मिले जो अखिलेश सरकार ने तीन साल sign नहीं किया मुझे sign करके प्रदेश में लागू करना है | तो वह जिस प्रकार से और पहले तीन दिन का जो मैंने उनका जो काम देखा है, जो कार्यक्रम देखा है मुझे पूरा विश्वास है उत्तर प्रदेश का उज्ज्वल भविष्य योगी आदित्यनाथ के हाथ में है, बहुत अच्छी चयन हुई है | मैं प्रधानमंत्री मोदी जी, अध्यक्ष अमित शाह जी और पूरे पार्लियामेंट्री बोर्ड और उत्तर प्रदेश के नेतृत्व और सभी आमदारों को धन्यवाद देता हूँ और बधाई देता हूँ कि इतना अच्छा चयन किया, एक व्यक्ति जो वास्तव में गरीबी से अवगत है और गरीब जनता की सेवा करने के लिए संकल्पित हैं |

Q: जी, बिलकुल सर्वगुण संपन्‍न हैं योगीजी | तो आपने उनका नाम पहले क्यों नहीं दिया, मुख्यमंत्री के बतौर आपको पहले नाम उनका देना चाहिए था ना, बाद में क्यों चयन किया? नहीं यह सवाल तो उठता है ना कि अगर आपको उनका नाम पहले देना चाहिए था, इतने सर्वगुण संपन्‍न हैं योगीजी, तो शायद हैं |

A: शायद पहले देते तो 40-50 सीटें और आ जाती फिर और तकलीफ हो जाती इस state में | Leader of Opposition भी जैसे जनता ने दिल्ली में लोक सभा में एक Leader of Opposition बनाने लायक भी कोई विपक्ष नहीं रखा है वैसे शायद उत्तर प्रदेश की भी यह हालत हो जाती |

Q: अच्छा यह बताइये कि योगीजी को बनाने में आपके उस statement का कितना हाथ है जिसमें आपने कहा था कि कब्रिस्तान में जो है वह बिजली जाती है और शमशान में बिजली नहीं जाती | यह तो आप बताइगा, और यह बड़ा सोचा समझा आपका statement था?

A: यह जो सवाल था, यह इस प्रदेश में और जो लोग इस प्रदेश में गावों में रहते हैं जिसको और कोई शहरों में भी नॉएडा के बाहर भी जाने का मौका मिला है तो सभी जानते हैं कि इस प्रदेश में भेदभाव इतना भयंकर था कि जाति के आधार पे विकास होता था, जाति और धर्म के आधार पे तय होता था कहाँ पे सुविधाएं पहुंचेंगी नहीं पहुंचेंगी, जाति और धर्म के आधार पे तय होता था कि पुलिस का … मिलेगा, नहीं मिलेगा | और एक प्रकार से जो भ्रष्टाचार और गुंडाराज इस प्रदेश में बढ़ गया था उसको ख़त्म करने के लिए जनता ने भारतीय जनता पार्टी और हमारे सहयोगी दलों को इतनी बड़ी भारी बहुमत दी है, 80% से ज्यादा सीटें दी हैं | और मैं समझता हूँ कि एक विषय नहीं कई विषय थे, लोग त्रस्त थे गुंडागर्दी से, लोग त्रस्त थे भ्रष्टाचार से, लोग विकास चाहते थे, लोग चाहते थे कि चौबीस घंटे सबको बिजली मिले सिर्फ सैफई में चौबीस घंटे बिजली न जाये, लोग चाहते थे कि जब विकास हो तो एक ही इलाके में पूरा पैसा ना जाये या कुछ ही गाँव में न जाये, सभी गावों में विकास पहुंचे | लोग चाहते थे कि जब केंद्र सरकार लाखों करोड़ रुपये देने को तैयार हैं उत्तर प्रदेश के विकास में तो राज्य सरकार बाधा नहीं बने उसमें सहयोग करे |

और मैं समझता हूँ जनता ने एक anti-incumbency, नकारात्मक .. समाजवादी और बहुजन समाज पार्टी और कांग्रेस को उनके ख़राब काम के लिए नकारात्मक में ही उनके खिलाफ वोट दिया है और भारतीय जनता पार्टी की केंद्र सरकार और भारतीय जनता पार्टी का जो 2017 का संकल्प पत्र था उसके ऊपर एक सकारात्मक ने वोट दिया है कि वह विश्वास करते हैं कि प्रधानमंत्री मोदी जी के नेतृत्व में जो अच्छा काम केंद्र में हुआ है अब भारतीय जनता पार्टी की उत्तर प्रदेश की सरकार भी उतना अच्छा काम उत्तर प्रदेश में करेगी |

Q: इस पूरे चुनाव में यह बहुत देखा गया कि आप लोगों को polarization, आपने जमके बोला गया कि आप बीजेपी और मोदीजी और आप सब जो हैं आपने मिलके पूरे के पूरे इस चुनाव को polarize कर दिया, अब तो सोचते होंगे अब तो आपका प्रचंड बहुमत आ गया तो अब थोड़ा मान लीजिये कि हाँ हमने थोडा polarize किया, बहुत नहीं पर थोड़ा तो किया ही?

A: भारतीय जनता पार्टी और हमारे जनसंघ के दिनों से, मैं 1950 से आपको बता रहा हूँ, भारतीय जनता पार्टी का एक मात्र लक्ष्य रहा है कि जो गरीब से गरीब जनता है जो समाज में एकदम अंतिम छोर में खड़ी है, उसकी सेवा करने का लक्ष्य लेके जनसंघ और उसके बाद भारतीय जनता पार्टी राजनीतिक क्षेत्र और समाज में उतरी है | हमने कभी भी जात या धर्म के आधार पे भेदभाव नहीं किया है, आप लोग के channels media के कई लोग बार बार यह कहते थे कि भारतीय जनता पार्टी ने अपने core voters को छोड़ दिया | यह आपके channel पे भी मैंने कई बार सुना है, मुझे भी पूछा गया जब मैं आपके channel पे उत्तर प्रदेश चुनाव में आया था | आप लोगों का लगातार यह दावा था कि हमने नोटबंदी करके हमारे core voters को नाराज़ कर दिया, आपका लगातार यह दावा था कि प्रधानमंत्री सिर्फ गरीब की सोचते हैं बाकी वर्गों की नहीं सोचते हैं |

लेकिन आप हमारे तीन वर्ष के कार्यकाल का आंकलन लीजिये, भारतीय जनता पार्टी ने कभी भी कोई कार्यक्रम में किसी भी प्रकार का भेदभाव नहीं किया | हमारे हर कार्यक्रम को सबका साथ सबका विकास सामने रखते हुए हमने समाज के हर वर्ग को लाभ हो लेकिन जो गलत काम करते हैं वह कोई भी जाति के हो, कोई भी धर्म के हो उसके ऊपर पूरी तरीके से कार्रवाई हो, इस प्रकार का काम केंद्र में किया और राज्य सरकार भी बिना भेदभाव के विकास करेगी, जनता की सेवा करेगी | Polarization आप लोग के नज़रिए में रहा है हमारे नज़रिए में हमने सच्चाई जनता के सामने रखी |

इस प्रकार के totally बेबुनियाद speculation पे कम से कम ज़िम्मेदार लोग और ज़िम्मेदार channels ना करें |

Q:सवाल चूँकि हर …. का है इसलिए इन बातों की भूमिका देनी पड़ी, राज्यों में खासकर उत्तर प्रदेश जब आपके पास है केंद्र में भी आपकी सरकार है | राज्य के जो खर्चे हैं और राज्य की जो आमदनी है इन दोनों में huge crack है, राज्यों के पास किसी के पास पैसा नहीं है कि विकास का काम करें | क्या आप आश्वासन देते हैं कि आपकी सरकार वहां के किसानों का ऋण माफ़ करेगी?

A: शत-प्रतिशत |

Q: जबकि जेटली जी ने कहा है कि मैं कुछ नहीं करने जा रहा हूँ, आप लोग अपना पैसा जनरेट कीजिये अपना काम कीजिये, तो क्या विकास संभव है इस कमी की स्थिति में?

A: सबसे पहले तो मैं स्पष्ट, दो-टूक आश्वासन देता हूँ | छोटे और सीमान्त जो किसान हैं, small and marginal farmers, इनका फसली ऋण, crop loan, हमने माफ़ करने का संकल्प लिया था 2017 के चुनाव में और हमने बहुत स्पष्ट रास्ता निकाला है, राज्य सरकार उत्तर प्रदेश की, जितने छोटे और सीमान्त किसानों का फसली ऋण है उसको शत-प्रतिशत माफ़ करेगी | इसके लिए हमें देश के वित्त मंत्री जी से कुछ नहीं चाहिए, यह राज्य सरकार का दायित्व है और राज्य सरकार इसको करने जा रही है, पहली बात | दूसरी बात आप सबको मैं बताऊँ, प्रधानमंत्री मोदी जी और अमित शाह जी जब संकल्प पत्र बन रहा था उन्होंने इतना डिटेल में हमसे इसकी जांच करवाई और एक एक आइटम संकल्प पत्र में जो लिखा हुआ है उसका पूरा कैलकुलेशन हुआ कि उसका कितना बोझा होगा राज्य के बजट के ऊपर | पूरे बजट को स्टडी करवाया गया एक टीम द्वारा जिसमें मैं भी एक छोटा अंग था, रात-रात भर बैठके 240 आइटम हैं हमारे संकल्प पत्र में, 240 items, 240 item का हमने item by item निकाला क्या बजट होगा, सालाना कितना खर्चा होगा, 5 साल में कितना खर्चा होगा, budget study किया यूपी का, खोजा कि इसमें भ्रष्टाचार बंद करके हम कितना पैसा बचा पाएंगे, खोजा कि जिस प्रकार से भूमाफिया और खनन माफिया वहाँ पे काम कर रही है उस पैसे को ईमानदारी से राजस्व में convert करके कितना additional revenue state के पास आएगा और उसमें से हम क्या काम कर पाएंगे |

तो आपको जानके ख़ुशी होगी और शायद मेरी गाड़ी में वह statement भी होगा क्योंकि हम लगातार लगे हुए हैं कि उसमें क्या क्या items को priority में लेना है उत्तर प्रदेश सरकार ने | Every item has been categorically calculated, कितना खर्चा होगा, वह खर्चा कैसे राज्य सरकार करेगी और मैं आपको विश्वास दिलाता हूँ हम कभी कोई ऐसा assurance हमारे manifesto में या संकल्प पत्र में नहीं लिखते हैं जो हम बाद में पूरी तरीके से पूरा न कर पाएं |

Q: जो RSS की ideology है हिन्दू राष्ट्र, क्या हम समझें कि उसकी शुरुआत हो गयी है, पहला सवाल? दूसरा सवाल भी पूछ ही लेता हूँ फिर जवाब दे दीजिएगा आप, क्योंकि मैं जम्मू कश्मीर से आता हूँ वहां पे आपने PDP के साथ एक Agenda of Alliance sign किया है उसमें state को power projects वापिस देने की बात कही गयी है, तो कब आप दे रहे हैं स्टेट को और कितने power project दे रहे हैं ?

A: पहली बात तो राष्ट्रीय स्वयंसेवक संघ एक socio-cultural organisation है, उसका राजनीति में कोई सहभागिता नहीं है | भारतीय जनता पार्टी एक independent राजनीतिक दल है, राष्ट्रीय स्वयंसेवक संघ moral building, character building एक प्रकार से एक ऐसी संस्था है जो समाज में अच्छा काम कर रही है और उसमें उनकी कल्पना है कि जो हिन्दू वर्ग है उसकी भी चिंता करने के लिए कोई ना कोई संस्था ने काम करना चाहिए | और हर धर्म का अधिकार है कि वह अपनी अपनी चिंता करने के लिए अपनी अपनी organisations खड़ी करती है | भारतीय जनता पार्टी एक राजनीतिक दल है जो कोई किसी प्रकार का भेदभाव, किसी प्रकार की एक ideology किसी और के ऊपर thrust करने में नहीं believe करती है | हम समझते हैं देश के 120 करोड़ जनता सामान्य है, सबका सेवा करने का दायित्व राजनीतिक दल जब सत्ता में आती है उसका रहता है | और प्रधानमंत्री ने पुनः दोहराया उत्तर प्रदेश की विजय के अगले दिन रविवार को, 12 तारीख को, कि एक बार चुनाव ख़त्म हो जाये तो सरकार का दायित्व पूरे 22 करोड़ यूपी की जनता को सेवा करने का है | ऐसा नहीं कि 325 सीट जीते तो 325 सीट पे विकास होगा और बाकी सीटों पे काम नहीं होगा, किसी वर्ग ने वोट दिया या नहीं दिया, किसी धर्म या जाति ने दिया या नहीं दिया हम उसका आंकलन लगाते नहीं है, उसपे देखते नहीं है | पूरे 22 करोड़ उत्तर प्रदेश की जनता की सेवा करना, यही हमारा धर्म है और यही काम भारतीय जनता पार्टी करेगी | जहां तक कांग्रेस-मुक्त भारत का सवाल है, यह तो जनता ने मुझे लगता है तय कर लिया है, उत्तर प्रदेश में इतने सारे बड़े बड़े poster और banner और campaign और मुझे पता नहीं दो भ्रष्ट्राचारी  नेताओं का साथ कैसे लाभ दे सकता था मेरे तो समझ के बाहर था, जनता ने वह करके भी दिखा दिया कि उनको वह साथ पसंद नहीं आया |

वह जो है ना anything multiplied by 0 is equal to 0, यह prove हो गया है | और मात्र 7 सीटें और 6% वोट, जो 2012 में वोट मिला था उसका भी आधा रह गया है कांग्रेस का | तो हमने नहीं यह तो जनता ने निर्णय कर लिया कि उनको कांग्रेस-मुक्त भारत चाहिए | यह ज़रूर मैं रखना चाहूँगा अगर आपकी अनुमति हो कि राहुल गाँधी जी को मैं शुभेक्षा देता हूँ वह कई वर्षों तक कांग्रेस की सेवा करते रहे वह भी इस देश के लिए बहुत ज़रूरी है |

जहाँ तक जम्मू कश्मीर की बात है, यह power projects एक publicly listed company NHPC के हैं उसके लिए कोई ऐसा प्रावधान नहीं हो सकता है कि उठाके handover कर दिए जायें | हम जम्मू कश्मीर के लोगों के लिए और ज्यादा power projects लगें, और ज्यादा उनके यहाँ अच्छी व्यवस्था बने बिजली की जिससे 24/7 उनको बिजली मिल पाए उसपे चिंता और काम कर रहे हैं | आप को जानके ख़ुशी होगी आज ही दोपहर को दो बजे मैंने पूरे जम्मू कश्मीर के जो अधिकारी हैं सीनियर अधिकारी और उनके Power Secretary और उनके Deputy Chief Minister डॉ निर्मल सिंह जी के साथ विस्तार में जम्मू कश्मीर के विद्युतीकरण के ऊपर review लिया है और कैसे जम्मू कश्मीर में हर एक के घर में चौबीसों घंटे बिजली पहुंचा सकें उस काम का पूरा मोनिटरिंग और रिव्यु आज ही मैंने अपने दफ्तर में किया है | हम संकल्पित हैं कि जम्मू कश्मीर को सस्ती, अच्छी बिजली हर एक को मिले, वहां पे उद्योग पनपे, नए रोज़गार के अवसर बनें उसपे हमारा पूरा ध्यान आकर्षित है |

Anchor: So पियूष गोयल जी मुझे पता है आपको जाना है, so thank you very much for being here and talking to students. आप आये आपका बहुत शुक्रिया, बहुत शुभेक्षा |

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

All the friends who have come from all across the country, I believe you have 40 chapters represented here from the length and breadth of the country, a warm welcome to all of you in Delhi. Of course, I myself am a expat in Delhi, I am not a Delhite. But having taken up residence here I think I can welcome all of you here. Great to see the active participation, also I have fond memories of this programme. I still remember in the same venue, probably, two years ago? Last year, when somebody from that corner asked me about the Tamil Nadu problem. And you guys don’t realize, you almost caused the whole election to revolve around that subject. So I will have to be extra cautious, is there an election coming up soon? Good, you didn’t have it before the Uttar Pradesh election.

But I am delighted at the subject you have chosen – Take Pride. Undoubtedly, each one of us is passionate about the work we do, is passionate about our country, cares for what is happening around us, is looking for a better future for us, our families, our cities, our states, our country. And if one really goes to see the success of any society, the future of any nation is going to be determined by the thinking of the youth, by the confidence that the youth have in their own abilities, in the work that they are doing. And I think nation’s destinies have been decided by what we do during our lifetime and what we leave behind for the next generation. It’s very important that our thinking is one of positivity, is one of self-confidence, is one of confidence and comfort in our own ability to take this country to greater heights.

And there is a large section of society, a large section of people who are the permanent naysayers, everything and anything that’s happening, they are all the time looking for fault, they are all the time looking to deride themselves or their own country or their own organizations. And then there is an even larger section of society that believes in itself, that believes in the work that they do. But, very often, the opinion makers or that section of society which has a reach in media, a reach in, the people who can actually frame the national discourse, the national opinion are the ones who are perpetual critics. In Hindi, they call it the नकारात्मक सोचने वाला | जिन लोगों की सोच में ही एक प्रकार से एक दुखी मन है, एक प्रकार से चिंता में घिरा रहता है, हर चीज़ में उसको कमियाँ महसूस होती हैं, ख़ुशी नहीं हो सकती | और एक बहुत बड़ा वर्ग है समाज का जो छोटे में भी, कम में भी बहुत खुशियाँ पाता है, who is satisfied, who is happy, who is able to enjoy life, live a full life. But his word, his voice doesn’t probably get heard. And we, in this room, when I was asking Raghu, Jacob, I was asking Mr Bhagrodia who came to receive me and bring me here, are we really representing India in this room or are we representing a section of society in this room.

And look within ourselves, let’s have a test check on the person sitting on both your sides. Do we reflect the voice of maybe 350 or 400 million young Indians in the age bracket that probably gets represented in the Summit or are we the voice of a very small section of India, a section which is relatively more privileged, a section which has not to worry about the next square meal later in the evening or tomorrow, a section which has not been deprived of basic amenities like power or clean drinking water, quality health, good education. And you will realize that a lot of the thought that we have and very often that critical approach is shaped because we are already satisfied with what are the basics of life. And, therefore, we have the ability to think negatively. Unless this section of society starts taking pride in its country, starts taking pride in the ability of this country to do more, to do better, we really won’t be able to do better for the rest of society, for the rest of the world, for the rest of the country and take this country to greater heights.

I myself came from a very cocooned section of society, probably, till one visits the villages in Odisha or the villages in Uttar Pradesh or Bihar, or the villages around a coal mine, for example. It is very difficult to understand what life is beyond our cities, beyond our own existence. In fact, I am delighted that you are putting together paper from across the country on one platform that itself is another problem that this country is grappling with is the sectorial thinking in terms of our region, our state, our community. We are still to get out of our own and look at the nation as a whole. And, therefore, putting together 110 educational institutions under your banner and reaching out to people from across the country is a great movement that I think the young Indian group of CII has started.

Possibly, you may consider taking this to the next level to involve some more smaller towns, some people from the little more of the interiors of the country to understand and appreciate their point of views. We read in the papers or see on television, for example, about the drive in Uttar Pradesh against these roadside Romeos. Now for many of us in this room, who are very unhappy about discotheques closing down at 1 o’clock in the night and who believe that they should be allowed to run all through the night, our world revolves around the freedom to be able to party all through the night, the freedom to do what we want. But we don’t realize that there is a large section out there for whom that is a pipe dream to be able to party at 1 o’clock in the night, to be able to go to school in the morning or to go to college and not being harassed itself is a luxury.

I had a relative who was staying with me last night, who mentioned that a few months ago she had gone to Vrindavan. And in the course of her driving around in, I don’t know, that auto rickshaw or that larger vehicle that you see in the smaller towns, from a moving vehicle somebody snatched her purse and ran away, got onto a bike and got away. When she went to the police station because her credit cards and everything were there, they said oh, this is quite normal. We can’t do anything about that, forget about it. It took her great pain to get atleast a dairy entry put on the police station, just so that she could atleast make a complaint for her credit cards or maybe travel on her flight back to Pune where she came from, and would have otherwise not had an identity proof for the airline to allow her in.

But the callousness of the policeman at the police station was something we should be very worried about. But there is a large section of society which is completely insulated from this kind of difficulties that a common man has to face in India, in the country as a whole. And, therefore, when we talk of the problems of India, we sometimes get restricted only to our very small thinking or the small world around us without really understanding what the larger section of society has to face. And then within our small world, we are not able to take pride in all the good that is happening in the country and we land up becoming perpetual critics or perpetual dissatisfied lot of young boys and girls.

In fact, we celebrate National Youth Day on Swami Vivekananda’s birthday on 12^th January, and Swami Vivekananda was one person who took a lot of pride in his country. He was willing to say that we have a lot of problems, but within those problems, first, I feel very proud that I am an Indian, and second, I feel more committed and empowered as an Indian to do something to resolve the problems that my nation has. But he would not let the problems overcome his pride. And believe you, ladies and gentlemen, I find that in rural areas. I find that sense of pride amongst the lesser privileged sections of society. When I go to a village, I can actually, despite all the problems that they may be facing, see the sense of pride in them for whatever they are doing, even the sputtering of little bit of words of English that that young boy or girl may use to communicate is with a sense of pride ki I have progressed and I have started learning a little bit of English.

So problems come in all our lives, problems come in different dimensions in different people’s lives. It’s our approach to those problems and our approach to the future of the country that really determines whether we will be a society which will be one society, one nation, one society and a society of people who are proud about their nation, who are proud about the achievements that this nation has done. And for the problems we will be a group of people, a group of individuals who will work collectively to find solutions, to look for a better tomorrow for the nation, and not only for ourselves but even for the people who are less privileged, who have been deprived of a good quality of life despite 7 decades of independence.

In fact, Nelson Mandela in prison used to often, I am told, quote from that famous poetry, Invictus, where in the last stanza, ‘it matters not how strait the gate, how charged with punishments the scroll; I am the master of my fate: I am the captain of my soul.’ It’s something we have all heard about all through in our school days I am sure we have all learned this poetry. But somehow over the years, we have become a society dependent on somebody else to help us have a better future for ourselves, to determine our fate.

Today, I was doing a review with the Renewable Energy Ministry and we were looking at ways and means to promote domestic manufacturing. And I was at pains to explain to my officials, can we not work this whole programme in such a way that we are not dependent on the government. Can we not promote domestic manufacturing of renewable energy equipment in such a way that we are not dependent on the government; we are not dependent on any foreign funding. Can we not make a self-reliant programme which can then progress and become a success rather than waiting for interventions from others to make this programme successful. And till we all accept that we are the masters of our fate and we will determine the future of this country, give India a better future, I don’t think this country can really achieve its true potential and I think we will remain an unsatisfied and unhappy lot of individuals.

In fact, all of you have had a good high quality of education and are I believe at the cusp of very successful careers in your life. This is the time one will have to choose that in the course of our work what will be our contribution to nation building? What part of our life will be dedicated to a better future for that section of society which has remained deprived, which has remained underprivileged and how we will be better citizens of this nation. And to my mind, the first and foremost criteria to be good citizens of this nation is to have pride in your nation first, truly imbibe that Indian spirit, that spirit of Indianness.

And I have no doubt in my mind if you have registered to come and be a part of this conference, each one of you is truly believing in your country, in a better future for your country. And while we are working for a better future, I think being an important and integral part of society is as much important as whatever work or profession that each one of you is following, that each one of you is conducting. After all, when we talk of the future of India, we often talk of the demography of India, we often talk of the big demand that India has in terms of economic opportunity, we take pride in our democracy. And, ultimately, this demographic dividend coupled with democracy and the huge demand that we have in India is what will result in the development of India. But whether all of these will be leveraged for a better India or will become a bane for India is something that each one of us is going to determine in the next few years.

Fortunately, India is lucky to have a very strong institutional democratic framework. We have a strong press, a media which keeps all of us on our toes. We have large number of free civil society institutions, which ensure that there is balance in whatever is happening in different elements of the country. And then we have a strong judiciary which is the final arbiter, which ensures that each of the other legs of this democracy be it bureaucracy, be it the political establishment, be it media, everybody else, a free society or a civil society, everybody works in an orderly fashion. In fact, that is what differentiates India from many other countries. And then when you couple this with the rich tradition and heritage and culture that we have inherited over the years that truly defines India.

In fact, the strong value systems, family value systems, that we have is something that is a treasure trove for India. The fact that we can fall back on neighbors, on family, relatives or friends in an hour of need is something very unique to India, you don’t see that in the developed world anymore. It’s a very clinical society in many parts of the world. A lot of wealth, but not necessarily a good element of happiness, in those parts of the world. And, my own sense is that today the youth of India with their entrepreneurial spirit, with the ability to think laterally with their out of the box ideas, are going to enable in the next few years a story where India will lead the world rather than following what happens in the rest of the world. And, to my mind, the India of today is just at the cusp of a revolution in almost every section of society, be it in research and development, be it in Startups and Stand Ups, in new ideas, in innovation, be it in our ability to provide technology, to provide knowledge, to provide skill to the rest of the world and be it in our ability to scale up programmes in the country in such a manner that we can really look at inclusive growth through the length and breadth of the country where even the Eastern part of India, the part which over so many years has remained deprived of development, can also join the national mainstream and look for a better future for its citizens, for its people.

In fact, gradually, I am glad to see that the youth of today are moving away from becoming job-seekers to becoming job-generators. After all, when you read the examples of these young boys and girls starting up an Ola or starting up a new e-commerce venture, you really feel proud; young boys and girls in their 20s with a mission to scale new heights, to come with new innovations, new technologies, is something that makes all of us proud.

In fact, very often when we go to the smaller villages and we see some of the ideas that they give us, it’s truly remarkable. And there are so many ideas which don’t get scale, which don’t get an opportunity to really get an outreach beyond a very small area. Recently, President Pranab Mukherjee, had invited 10 innovators in a programme at Rashtrapati Bhavan. They had come and met me just about 4 or 5 days ago. Some of the innovations that those people had come up with, there was a young 10^th standard boy, there was a tribal woman in her 40s. There were some young 20-30 year olds who had come up with innovations related to the power sector. There was somebody who had come up with some very very interesting ideas on cooking stoves. So, a lot of innovation happening in the rest of the country, which very often we are not even aware of. But India is coming to terms with a lot of new ideas, lot of new thoughts and I think that is what will define our future. And that is what, to my mind, is going to take India to the next level of development. And I can give you so many examples where India today is showing the path to the rest of the world.

I don’t know if last time I had shared with you about my LED programme, the programme where we are trying to convert all of India to use LED bulbs and LED tube lights rather than the traditional incandescent bulbs or CFL bulbs that India has been using for many years. But that single programme to convert all the lighting load of this country to LED has a potential to reduce the carbon dioxide emission by 80 million tonnes a year, 80 million tonnes. The power bills that all the citizens of this country pay, that all of you pay in your homes, have a potential reduction of Rs 40,000 crore, annually, when we all convert to LED bulbs, Rs 40,000 crore – $6.5 billion, every year can be saved only by converting all our lighting loads to LED.

Of course, there are many other concomitant advantages in terms of lower peak load that the country will require, reducing investments in more power generation and all of that. Now, that’s a programme that in India was going on at a snail’s pace. Until 2014, a government company which was mandated to promote LEDs was selling 600,000 bulbs every year with a good amount of subsidy and a price which was about 10 times what it costs today. We were able to scale up that programme to make it a national mission. And I am delighted to share with you that the cost of those bulbs has fallen by about 88%, in the last two and a half years, 88% reduction. And, today, the nation is selling more than 1 million bulbs every day, every single day – half of them by this company, this same government company which used to sell 600,000 in a year, is now selling about 150 million in a year and the private sector is selling a similar amount. Nearly 300 million LED bulbs being sold in India every year in a short span of two years. And you will be happy to know that probably, India will be the first large country in the world that by 2019, we will almost be 95% plus LED.

Our approach is that India should stop …. the West and just stop looking at programmes in a very small fashion, but having the self-confidence that we can do better than the rest of the world. And that can only happen when we are confident in our own ability, when we are confident about this nation’s ability to accept new technology, to accept new ideas. For example, this government is seriously working to see can we as a nation become a 100% electric vehicle country using electric vehicles only by 2030. Now there is no country of the size and scale of India in the world that has an ambition anywhere close to that. The current level of innovation in this country on electric vehicles is almost non-existent.

I have a hybrid car which I am using; a hybrid vehicle which works both on petrol and electric battery, but it only reduces the fuel consumption by about 50%. But if we could actually imagine that as a nation we will move to 100% electric vehicles by 2030, we could actually be looking at a saving in our oil imports annually by a $100 billion every year. But you tell anybody that India is planning to be a 100% electric vehicle country by 2030 and we take a vote in this room, I don’t think 10 hands will go up who will say that this is possible. When I first said 100% LEDs by 2019, nobody, absolutely nobody was willing to support me. When we first said India will be a 100 GW solar installation base by 2022, everybody and their uncle and aunt had notes written out why it’s impossible; whether it’s the transmission infrastructure, whether it’s the cost – whatever. But whether we believe in ourselves, whether we believe in the ability of Indians to scale up, to think innovatively, to produce new technologies is for us in this room to decide.

And believe me friends, unless we believe in ourselves, nobody else is going to come and better our life for us. It’s an entrepreneurial spirit that we have that is going to determine what the future of India is going to be like. And it’s only entrepreneurs and thinkers and innovators who can be the harbingers of change in this country. Today, if anybody was to do a study of the United States of America, it’s really a land of innovation. What is distinguishing the US from the rest of the world, in some sense, even from Europe? It’s their ability to innovate, their ability to come up with new and new technologies in almost every field and then make money out of those innovations.

I was the other day looking up and I found that no big significant discovery has happened in our country in several decades. We do not have any patent of significance that we have created in so many years, but then the choice is whether we accept that as going to be the reality always or we start moving the needle to see what we can do. And on this electric vehicle programme, we are looking to engage with our IITs, with our technologists, our technocrats, our scientists to see can India provide technology to the rest of the world. Can we become the leaders and show the path to the rest of the world to go towards electric vehicles, towards better technologies. And then when one starts talking to our engineers and our scientists, I promise you, you get so much enthusiasm which somehow has not got really encouraged over so many years and it only needs that little bit of push and we can do wonders in this country.

So I would really believe it’s our self-belief that is going to determine our nation’s future, our confidence in our abilities, and in our ability to deliver that is going to hopefully give a better quality of life to the less privileged sections of society. And, unless we stretch our mind with new ideas, unless we are willing to think out of the box, unless we are willing to expand our horizons, we will never be able to change the destiny of this country. And, believe me, once you expand your own horizon, then it won’t come back to the original, it will remain expanded. It’s like if you sleep 8 hours a day, your body gets tuned to it and you start sleeping 8 hours, anything less than that is a problem. But if you start working 18 hours a day and sleeping 5 hours or 6 hours a day, then anything more than that and you will fall ill. Then your body gets tuned to a 5 and a half hour sleep cycle and you have expanded your working hours, you have expanded your ability to work.

And, we in India do not have the luxury to run away from challenges. वह है ना कौन सा भाग लो या भागलो – something of that sort? Either you contribute, you participate – भाग लो – or you run away – भागलो – that’s the choice before all of us in this country. Are we going to run away from that stark reality that is India? Or are we going to take pride in our country that this is our country, this is my nation, these are my people and I am going to contribute to making this a better society, to making this a better world to live in. And when we are looking at contributing, when we are looking participating, जब हम तय करते हैं कि हमें भाग लेना है, then we need those Big Hairy Audacious Goals, the BHAG. We have to set goals for ourselves which are really big, bold and beautiful. We have to participate in making this society a better place to live in. We have to be concerned citizens to look for a better life for the people in the villages, for the poor in our cities.

And that’s what will determine the future of this country, and if you see the last three years, we have set very ambitious goals. We have set very ambitious targets in every single one of the programmes that we have embarked upon. Be it a simple thing like the Give it Up programme, where we offered to all of the citizens of India who can afford it not to take the subsidy on their LPG cylinders. And I am delighted that over 1 crore families decided to forego their LPG subsidy. How many of you in this room have foregone your LPG subsidy? So that’s still a far cry from what it should be. I mean look at the people around you. I suspect 90% of this room comes from families which could have easily given up their LPG subsidy. And do you know what happens with that money which you give up? It goes to give a free LPG connection to a poor family, saving the woman of that family, saving the children of that family from inhaling smoke, which I am told is equivalent to 400 cigarettes every day.

And we have embarked on a mission to provide 50 million families – 5 crore families, of which nearly 2 crore have already got a free LPG cylinder. That money came out of the contributions of all those who raised their hand just now and that’s your participation to give a better quality of life to somebody who had, who’s been less privileged, who didn’t have the kind of money to be able to afford that connection. Can I atleast hope that all of you will get back home and ensure that you give up your LPG subsidy so that we can expand this programme anymore. Is that a unanimous yes? Great!

You have embarked on that Organ Donation Programme, if I am not mistaken, right? Have all of you been a part of that Organ Donation Programme? All of you? Because I gave up my organs in 2016, with my family, my whole body; my wife, both my children and I have given our whole body.

So we have the ability to change the world, and if we take on these programmes, we take on these programmes to scale, just like the honorable Prime Minister takes on every programme to scale. He talked about financial inclusion. He made sure in four months, every family in the country had atleast one bank account. Now we are working to see that everybody has a bank account. There was the Unique Identification Number programme, previous government started it. The previous government had a problem that the Finance Minister and the Home Minister kept fighting and could not really convey the message and the advantages of the programme to even us in the Opposition. We also felt that this programme is only full of lacunae.

But when we came into government, we called the same people who had planned it, Nandan Nilekani, who was a candidate of the Opposition party. But we called him to try and explain to us and help us understand what really was behind the programme. And when we realized it was more a political problem, but the idea is good, we didn’t hesitate to adopt it. But then we didn’t adopt it to be a miniscule programme of the government. We didn’t sit on laurels saying that oh, we have launched Aadhar. We have not been able to bring it as a law. We have not been able to really scale it up. We didn’t cry over all of that. We have worked day and night such that today 99% of the adult population of India has a Unique Identification Number, an Aadhar Card.

And we hope soon to take it right down to all the children and make a 100% identification of every citizen of this country. Size and scale matters in a country of our size. When Prime Minister Modi set the audacious goal that every village in this country has to be electrified in a 1000 days, he didn’t ask us or he didn’t tell us that this is how you have to do it or that is how it will be done. And mind you, the villages that were left out, you will appreciate are the most difficult ones. After all, the fact that it took 70 years after independence for us to take power to these 18,452 villages, clearly shows there must be some difficulty why the power hasn’t reached there in so many years. Some are at the top of a mountain, some are in deep dense jungles, some are in areas infested by Maoists, and people where the access is almost impossible. There are villages where people actually take equipment to connect with the people with electricity on boats and on their shoulders up mountains to actually set up poles and set up electricity lines. But whether we should allow it to happen at the pace at which it was happening earlier, or we should aggressively go behind it and do it is a choice that nation had to make.

I remember when I did a study in Uttar Pradesh, for example. Between 2010 to 2014, all of a 100 odd villages were newly electrified in almost 4 years, and with the push that we gave, we were able to do almost 1300 villages in one year. In this country, even today, estimates are that 50 million homes don’t have electricity. Now can you imagine, 50 million is about 20 crore people, maybe 25 crore people were deprived of electricity. Can any of you imagine a life where from morning to night you have no electricity in your home? I suspect none of you has faced that situation in your life. I haven’t. I come from Mumbai where I get 24 hours uninterrupted power. In fact, I jokingly used to say maybe that’s why the Prime Minister chose to make me the Power Minister. He thought if having enjoyed that luxury, I will be able to make sure that the rest of the country can enjoy that. But then he set a deadline. He said by 2022, 15^th August, 2022, when the nation turns 75, when we are 75 years into independence, every citizen of this country should have a shelter, should have a roof over his head, he should have electricity in his home, he should have water, he should have good toilet facility, sanitation, a road leading up to his home, his or her home, quality education and healthcare in the vicinity, and with that objective, we are working on creating the framework of development which will reach us to that goal within this defined timeframe. And ladies and gentlemen, I can assure all of you that one mission that will succeed not by 2022, but well before that is to take power to every home in this country so that no child has to study without electricity.

Only this morning, I got a call from the new Chief Minister of Uttar Pradesh who’s got down to his job literally from Day 1, talking to me about my plans to electrify the rest of the villages, what we will do to take electricity to take electricity to all those far off habitations, you know those Majla’s, Tola’s, Dhaani’s, those small set of homes or group of small clusters of villages which don’t come as a revenue villages but are probably far off, and how nearly 1.8 crore families in Uttar Pradesh who still don’t have electricity can get electricity quickly. And you know what Yogi Adityanath told me this morning? He said पियूष जी यह काम मुझे दो वर्ष में करके दो – 2 years. That is the kind of passion that this country needs when we are going down the path of development. The urge and passion to achieve audacious goals will only help us reach there.

I remember when I first talked about a billion tonnes of coal production in India, all the naysayers, including predecessors of my Ministry which I run, ridiculed me saying what a stupid rookie we have as a Minister, he doesn’t even know what he is talking about. I said we will make sure coal is never a problem; it will be a surplus commodity. I am delighted to share with you that today India has surplus coal and surplus power. Whichever state wants whatever amount of coal or power is available in the country. In fact, I have a reverse problem, I could not achieve coal production this year because I have so much stock that I am not able to liquidate that I have actually got to scale down production and I am looking for new avenues to use that coal. Any of you has technologies on coal gasification, coal bed methane, converting coal to more value added products, please contact me immediately.

So there is a lot that can be done, we’ve got to believe in ourselves. We’ve got to set those audacious goals and we have got to have the confidence in our ability to do that. And nothing is impossible my young friends, nothing at all is impossible. We can achieve a better future for our nation, for the people of our nation.

In fact, the Bhagwad Gita, some of you may just think that I am talking only Hindu but I could as well quote from the Bible or from the Quran, everybody talks about positivity. And if I may just quote from the Bhagwad Gita, ‘we are kept from our goal not by obstacles, but by a clear path to a bigger goal. And I think it’s time that we as a nation and we the young people of India start planning for a great nation, for the superpower that India once upon a time was.

I was addressing the Gem and Jewellery Export Promoting Council on Saturday last, or Sunday, last Sunday. And I was sharing with them that until the 18^th century, India was the only country which had diamonds. We used to provide the diamonds to the rest of the world, diamond was not discovered anywhere else in the world except in India. वह जो बोलते है ना सोने की चिड़िया, वास्तव में भारत सोने की चिड़िया थी, भारत में जिस प्रकार की समृद्धि थी, the kind of wealth that we enjoyed in India was unparalleled. We have been looted, we have been plundered over several centuries. But, should we cry over that? Or should we empower ourselves to once again establish our rightful place in the comity of nations is a choice before all of us. And you young people are the ones who are destined to be that change. You are going to make a difference to the future of India, because you have opportunity, you have quality education; you have that passion, that fire in your belly to want to do something. I think if you didn’t have that fire in the belly, you wouldn’t have registered to come for this programme. I am quite sure if you have come for this programme, there is something different in you which empowers you to want change, want a better future which is why you are after all here.

And I would urge each one of you to set those audacious goals for your life, to participate in nation building, maybe some of you would participate in politics, after all, it is an integral part of the future of India, we can’t wish away politics. Somebody has to run the nation in an ordinary fashion and if the good people don’t come into politics, well, if there is a vacuum somebody else will fill that vacuum. But as more and more good people come in and stay good while they are in politics. And there are numerous opportunities for good people. There are numerous good people in public life, in all parties. Please don’t at all think that I am suggesting all of you join the Bhartiya Janta Party, or that I am the only good party and everybody else is bad. We can agree to disagree on many things. We can fight politically. We can have different points of view. But, save and except, for a few individuals, there is still a lot of goodness in the country, each one of you can choose your path, your calling in life. Some of you may say no I am not cut out to be a politician, but I would like to associate with an NGO or I would like to associate with tribal affairs, to do something for the tribal parts of India, the poorer people who live in tribal areas. Somebody may want to do something about education, be a part of Akansksha, or any of these organisations. Somebody may want to be a part of skill development, another great area to contribute to the future of our young brothers and sisters in this country.

I would give you a small example how India can, and how we are positioning India when we plan our various programmes. I don’t know if you have seen the BHIM app, the Bharat Interface for Money. The BHIM app that the honorable Prime Minister launched about a couple of months ago, is an app which will enable payments between two people using a mobile phone without the need for any credit or debit card. Now, to my mind, and I was involved in the entire exercise to develop and then promote this, to my mind, that one app has the potential to change the way the world does business, the world transacts money. And I have the confidence that if we are able to develop and further mature these technologies given the large mobile base that we have in India, I visualize the situation where India will lead the world and possibly be the death knell of all the Visa and Mastercard cards and American Expresses of the world, and the world will be using Indian technologies to transact and do business and move money from one to the other. India has that potential.

So it’s a new India we are looking at, an empowered India, an India which believes in itself, an inclusive India where all of us, all of India, works together for a better tomorrow, works together for a better tomorrow for all Indians, not just for one section of society or the privileged section of society. And I have no doubt in my mind that the people power, particularly, the power of the youth, largely represented in this room and across the length and breadth of India, will lead this country to change to a better tomorrow, to a new India which we can all be proud of, a new India which in the years ahead will lead the world, which will show a path not only of prosperity but of happiness to the rest of the world. A new India which will share its traditional family values, its rich heritage and culture and give a path to the rest of the world for a better tomorrow. I wish all of you well in your own endeavours, in your own work and I am sure that as you go back to your respective cities, your respective destinations at the end of this conference, you will go back as citizens with a passion to serve with a compassion for the rest of society, and with a zeal to be citizens who make a difference to your nation, proud Indians of a proud country contributing to make the whole world proud of India.

Thank you very much.

 

Thank you so much sir for inspiring us once again. We are open now for a few questions, I just thought I will kick-start it with a slightly more political questions so we will try to avoid Tamil Nadu this time.

Q: Sir after the UP elections and the resounding victory for the BJP in the UP elections and the changes correspondingly which will happen in the Rajya Sabha numbers, just wanted to kind of ask you what would be the big ticket changes that we can probably expect to see from the government, that is one part. And given that after the UP results I am sure that the BJP government would be a lot more confident about 2019, so my question is what is the party thinking in order to make sure complacency doesn’t set in. And also, how would you tackle the united opposition, because I think the opposition is also coming to a point where they say the only way is if we could do something like what we did in Bihar. So that was my question sir.

A: As we have Question Hour in parliament, usually one supplementary is allowed, but then being a President of the organisation I think you certainly have more liberty. But yes, UP elections have been a watershed election. It’s an election which reflected two sides of the problem there or of the situation there. One was an anti-incumbency, very clearly the people were tired of goondaism, of corruption, of the poor law and order situation in that state. And people on the other hand had faith and trusted the Bhartiya Janta Party led by Prime Minister Modi to change their lives to give them a better future. They gave us a very very large support, a verdict which is unprecedented and I can assure all of you that right from Day 1, we have been on our feet. In fact, I had also not imagined the UP government to be so quickly off the ground in terms of starting to implement ideas, the young Power Minister who has just taken charge yesterday, Shrikant Sharma, was already on the phone with me day before yesterday, charting out what will be his priorities, what he needs to do to complete rural electrification, how we can ensure 24 hours power supply, what are the constraints, how he will raise funding. It was very impressive to talk to him on the phone and I believe in a day or two he is coming to meet me also.

As regards the Rajya Sabha, it’s a slow process of change, so I don’t suspect that the numbers will change very significantly, very quickly. It’s a House that has one-third of its composition changed every two years. The first impact will be in 2018, then 2020,  then 2022. So, really UPs impact will be felt over a period of time, many other states have also changed and, so clearly the BJP and NDA numbers are going to move up gradually. But I would like you to think, in the last three years we have not allowed our smaller number in Rajya Sabha to really cause us not to be able to implement any programme. We have not given ever the excuse of our smaller number in Rajya Sabha. In fact, in the history of India, never have so many game changing laws been passed as we saw in the last two and a half/three years. Very often people ask Finance Minister Mr Jaitley for a big bang budget, to my mind, Finance Minister jaitley has proven to be the best Finance Minister India has ever seen with a kind of improvements he has brought in the system, the strong macro-economic fundamentals, the ability to steer GST, something which India has been yearning for years and years and years to steer it with unanimity across the entire political spectrum, everybody holding different viewpoints, to steer it across India and get it passed in such a short period of time. And I don’t know if you are aware, nearly 7 laws, constitutional laws have been passed in the last two and a half years by this government without a majority in the Rajya Sabha.

So we believe in a consensus approach. We believe in taking everybody together. Sabka Saath, Sabka Vikas, of course is our credo. But even in parliament, more often than not you will see us talking and engaging with all parties. So really, it’s been an approach of taking everybody along and working together and our confidence is that since we are doing good for the nation it’s very difficult for anybody to really oppose it. So when I brought in the auction of coal mines, we had support from across the political spectrum. Of course, three parties opposed it, but then those three were the usual parties who can’t support transparency and all these things. I won’t repeat the names so that we don’t get into another slugfest, but it’s not difficult to imagine which those three parties were whose track record will tell you whether they were transparent and whether they believe in transparency in their own functioning.

As regards our confidence for 2019, let me assure you we go into every election to fight that election to win, no question of complacency. Every election for us is a challenge, we fight that election with the most serious sincerity and then we leave the result to the people of India. After the election gets over, we serve the nation as one. You heard Prime Minister Modi, now that the UP elections is over, we are not going to be a government for those who voted for us or the 325 constituencies where our candidates got elected, now our job is to serve 22 crore Uttar Pradeshiites. This is not a government for the one or the other.

So we are now in the service mode, we will have an election coming up in Delhi where I hope the people give us a chance to serve again. We will have an election in Gujarat. We will soon have an election in Himachal and Karnataka. And almost each one of these I see the BJP surging ahead, but no question of complacency. For that matter, I came back from Uttar Pradesh campaigning on 6^th March, and 6^th evening we were in meetings in my department to catch up on the backlog of work that I have missed out in the last weeks. Prime Minister has been on the job right through the elections, so he would campaign in the day, work through late hours in the night to make sure the UP election doesn’t mean the rest of the country or its working is stopped. Budgets were made in the midst of UP election. So Finance Minister Mr Jaitley would go, campaign, come back and still work on the budget.

So this is a government that works 24/7. We believe that when we are doing good the people of India are with us and, therefore, there is no question of worrying about a united opposition. If they are united the people will also be united against them. That’s what happened in Uttar Pradesh. After all, if two people who are corrupt or whose ideology doesn’t match at all and who were cursing each other until a few days back are going to start trying to create an alternative and hope to get people’s support, believe me, as they say, ye janta sab jaanti hai!

Q: Sir, this is Anush from Coimbatore, Tamil Nadu. Sir, I have three inputs that are very specific to you or Ministry. The first input is I think this LPG subsidies, I think even to this state more than 80% of the subsidies can be done away with. I think the only guys who need the LPG subsidies are those 50 million homes that do not have electricity because even today electricity cost and with the induction cooking technology, it’s cheaper to cook using electricity even when compared to subsidized cost of LPG, that’s number 1. Number 2, your dream of having, you know, all electric vehicles by 2030, I think we can achieve that far quicker because if we make a policy saying that all two-wheelers are going to be electric and that’s a little over 50% of our fuel consumption and that 50% can be achieved within three years. And the third submission is, I think the local DISCOMs have the highest amount of infrastructure. If you can do something to work out with the state governments to use this infrastructure for internet connectivity I think we can have a really really not only 100 smart cities but a smart India within the next 5 years. Thank you.

A: Thank you, all three are very good suggestions. What do you do gentleman?

Q: I spin yarn.

A: Yeah, Coimbatore is famous for that. But that’s the kind of positivity that this country needs, actually this is truly taking pride in your nation. I think each one of you in this room picks up a thread of ideas like this, imagine how we can transform India in the years to come. And I take your inputs with all humility, thank you very much. I would work on all of them. The internet connectivity idea, in fact, Andhra Pradesh has used to good measure. And, we in the centre are quite open to learning from each other. I remember when I became a Minister, Prime Minister had actually told me, pick up the best ideas from across the country, don’t bother which party rules which state. Pick up the best ideas and share best experiences with each other. So I learnt from Babu’s working where he instead of underground cabling and spending thousands of crores he leveraged on the electricity infrastructure, had overhead cables along with the whole infrastructure that was carrying power. And I am told at 1/10^th the cost, he’s been able to reach every home with internet connectivity. So, we really welcome this kind of ideas, your idea about two-wheelers, by the way, I have had meetings with atleast two companies Rajiv Bajaj one of them and TVS, talking to them why don’t you move totally into two-wheelers. And I remember Rajiv Bajaj about a year ago promised me that in six months, I will make sure I have a cost-competitive bike on electricity which I can sell. And we have so much electricity in this country, surplus today, which can be made available at very competitive prices to promote the electric vehicle industry. So if I get five people in this room who have this kind of positivity, we can move the mountains as they say.

Q: Good evening sir, let me first thank you, I think the whole of India and I am very sure has very deep respect for the work you are doing. Sir, I am Aditya Jain from … Hyderabad and we run a steel manufacturing unit which consumes around 10 MW of power. Lately we are seeing prices of renewable energy are touching new lows and also on the open access, we get power at the rate of Rs 2.50 to Rs 3. And in your speech here you said that electricity is surplus in India. So can you throw some light as to why DISCOMs are raising prices every year, and how do you see the prices of electricity in the coming 3-5 years?

A: I am always scared about questions from that corner. Renewable energy is another example of how if you think big, you can do big. Earlier, our whole renewable energy programme centered around those small projects where we used to buy power at very high prices and most often it used to be feed-in tariffs which was prone to corruption, and which was prone to padding and stuff like that. We moved away into transparent auctions and bidding, and to larger scale projects which has helped us drive down prices, as against Rs 7-8 for solar power when I became a Minister per unit, the last auction determined a levelised tariff of Rs 3.30 for solar power. Wind which used to traditionally be above Rs 4.5-5, plus government used to give accelerated depreciation or generation based incentive has come down to Rs 3.46 in my very first auction, without any government incentive, having withdrawn GBI and that 80% accelerated depreciation. So a lot of possibilities are there, we are trying to keep power cost as a whole at affordable levels. DISCOMs have a challenge of a lot of large past losses that they are trying to grapple with on the one hand, inefficient working, large amounts of manpower, lot of linkages, AT&C losses, power theft which we are trying to work with the DISCOMs, both the centre and states, to reduce the losses. And the third and the most important thing is the cross-subsidy, which helps the DISCOMs give farmers and the poor people, sometimes free power, sometimes very concessional power, and which cross-subsidy then is loaded on to open access charges or to the richer high tension consumers or large domestic consumers.

Now that’s a truism, that’s a reality of India. I am sure you will all appreciate that the poorer people or the farmers who still are having a hard time in this country, very often plagued by the vagaries of nature and not able to even get a fair price for their produce, do deserve some affirmative action to support them until they are able to rise in life. So I think that’s a reality that none of us in this room really should grudge. We pay a little more for our power but that, hopefully, in most cases, goes to serve a poorer person, to serve a farmer, produce for us, for our plate. And that truism will take a few more years to go away. My own effort is to keep the costs of power down. I think in the last 2 or 3 years, you will see and any study you can do through CII, the increase in power tariffs has been the smallest in the last three years. In fact, most DISCOMs will tell you their cost of power has come down because of cheaper domestic coal, because of availability of cheaper power on the power exchange. And I can reassure you that we are continuing to make effort to bring down power theft, to reduce AT&C losses, bring more efficiency in the DISCOM working so that just like Maharashtra and Gujarat has been able to reduce power tariffs in the last two years, hopefully, other states also can reduce power tariffs.

Q: Mantriji Namaskar, sir again from Tamil Nadu, on the lighter note, your excess power has been causing a great discomfort to us because governments are run from the prison these days. Like on the other note, you have been talking about electric vehicle, even the last time you were here, you spoke very strongly about electric vehicles. But even the cars you drive, the hybrid cars, you have seen the prices being upside only, we have not seen any subsidizing on any of these electric vehicles. Even the Mahindras have been finding it very difficult to market their cars because of the higher costs. What is the government trying to do to bring down the costs and make it affordable for anybody to buy?

A: First of all gentleman, I had mentioned it last year I can assure you that in the last 12 months we have been working relentlessly on this programme. You will be happy to know, and I am proud to share with you that I have a very distinguished Professor from IIT Chennai, who has taken a sabbatical from his work at IIT Chennai, Professor Ashok Jhunjhunwala, some of you from Chennai may have heard of him, who has left his work there, is working with me in Delhi now full time to try and promote and scale up the electric vehicle programme at an affordable price. And he is passionate about this programme and wants it to be a part of the Make in India initiative so that we don’t land up only importing cars and supporting foreign job creation, rather to have innovation and technology in India and make a Make in India electric vehicle successful in the country. He is working for that programme, day and night.

Now, as regards the incentives and subsidies, I personally believe subsidies are a detriment to the progress of any industry. It actually is a constraint, when you say you will get a subsidy then the amount of subsidy becomes the constraint for that project. Till LEDs and CFLs bulbs were given a subsidy by the government we could never scale it up. The first action I did was remove the subsidy and scaled up the programme and we could achieve such great success that Rs 310 became now Rs 41 in the last …. They have gone down to as low as Rs 38, but the next tender because of probably some changing dimensions internationally have come to Rs 41. Now this is the kind of game changing benefits India can get that you can reduce 310 to 41 in less than 2 years and scale it up to about a 100X, probably more than a 100, it’s 200X.

Even in electric cars, I am trying to work on a model where subsidies don’t define the scale at which these cars can be brought in. And I think if we can scale up the demand to larger levels without bothering about subsidy, the cost of manufacturing and production will come down, at best we may need to give some small concessions in GST or road taxes for 2 or 3 years. And that will be enough of an impetus to make this programme largely successful, that’s the model we are working on. We want to move out of the subsidy regime to a self-reliant, indigenous technology-driven, large scale of deployment model where economies of scale and technology will drive this programme, not government subsidy and intervention.

Q: My name is Vaibhav and my question is while whatever you have spoken about is about today and, maybe, tomorrow. But really the young Indians means the future and that future is extremely important, so one of the important, you know, things which this government has done is to ratify the Paris Climate Agreement, so that’s directly related to, in some senses, related to your Ministry. So I just wanted to know two specific points on that that by 2030, government of India has to have a 40% power generation or electricity generation through renewable sources or alternative sources. So how are we going to do about it and what is going to be the impact on the life of all the citizens in the country and how it is going to be impacted slowly and slowly.

Number 2 is that the forest cover of India has to grow up by another 5 million hectares by 2030 as per the Paris Climate Agreement, so how can young Indians and young India can play a role in working with the Ministry and the people to take care of that, and it also contradicts with the whole smart city and the new green field city concepts which the country is coming up with. So how are we planning to do and go about it?

A: Look, at the outset I must acknowledge that the interactions that I have had with some of you, I have had the opportunity to meet both the gentlemen on the dais with me on earlier occasion also, I have seen Mr Bhakrodia from close quarters and the kind of passion it brings to the table. And I mentioned it because he and I have had a lot of interaction about climate change on earlier occasions. I think there were one or two programmes in Mumbai which he had organized where he was engaging with the youth of Mumbai to discuss about the Paris Agreement which was a little bit before we went into COP21 negotiations. And I remember the passion he brought to the table to want to be a part of change, to want to do something about India. And that’s what empowers me to think that this group sitting here is going to be led by good Indians, good solid people who believe in India. And to my mind, achieving this 40% of the installed electric capacity, electricity generation base which is what we have committed in Paris is not difficult as long as we have people like all of you in this room.

I can, in fact, tell you going by the prices that we have determined now, this price empowers me to think we could even think of about 60 or 65% of India’s installed capacity base being of renewable energy. And it will need a large amount of storage capacity which we are trying to dovetail with the electric vehicle programme. So electric vehicle programme is not only about converting petrol vehicles to electric and reducing pollution in the cities or wherever these vehicles are used, it dovetails beautifully into our renewable energy programme. And, by the way, renewable energy programme is not only about clean environment, it’s not only about reducing pollution, it’s also about India’s energy security because we will have the assurance and guarantee that that power will be available for India and all Indians to enjoy for years and years to come at affordable prices. So when I sign a power contract for solar power at Rs 3.30 today, I know for 25 years people will enjoy power at that price. It’s not going to escalate with increasing cost of fuel or raw material or anything like that.

So when we plan projects, we plan it with a holistic approach, a 360 degree comprehensive approach. Similarly, the carbon sink, the 2.5 billion tonne carbon sick, the forest cover that you talked about, it’s not only about expanding the forest cover but about new trees being set up. It has as holistic impact on your life. When Nitin Gadkari planned that all the national highways will be greened on the central divider and both sides of the highway, it has a huge dimension to it. It has a dimension of adding to the carbon sink, reducing pollution, absorbing the carbon dioxide emitted from the vehicles, it has the dimension providing shade, therefore, giving you a better efficiency on your vehicles, it has a dimension for beautifying the country, it has a dimension to stopping dust. Dust is a big element in our pollution. Wherever we go we see dust all over our place. But when you go to Singapore or Dubai and Dubai has a lot of desert area also, but you don’t see the dust coming on your face and yes there is a storm, because they been able to pack it up by greening the cities, by greening the entire infrastructure developed areas. So when we plan a programme, it’s not because we have committed it in Paris, it’s because we believe it provides for a better life for the people of India. And each one of our programmes is centered around a positive impact, a fruitful impact to make the lives of every Indian better in the years to come.

I can assure you and I would seek your ideas, your participation. If you want to reach out to me, reach out to me directly, reach out to my through any of these colleagues sitting here, through Mr Bagrodia, through all the others in this room who have had a chance to meet me, I see some familiar faces here. There is enough and more opportunity for all of you to contribute. I have young interns and young professionals working in my office. My OSD is a guy who is an IIT Engineer, studied in IIM, worked in Mckenzie and is working for me in government at 1/20^th the salary he was getting before he joined me, and he’s been working for me since I was in opposition. But working with a passion, wanting to give back to society. I have young interns coming in who are working without a salary but say we want to give one year to the nation. They come with great ideas. They come with great passion. They come with an enthusiasm where 2-2, 3-3 nights they don’t get to sleep, they are working on some paper, some presentation, some research for me.

So it’s a time to believe in India. It’s a time to believe in yourself. And I have no doubt, you all are the leaders who will provide the future leadership to this country, who will provide that direction to the way the future of India is going to be defined.

Thank you.

 

 

Counsel, Russell Mehta, Vice Chairman, Andrey Polakow – honorable President of the WDC, Mr Stephanie Fisher – President of AWDC, Anup Bhai, Mr Sabyasachi Ray, Sanjay Bhai, all the distinguished delegates and guests from around the world, from the diamond sector, from the mining sector, also from the market place of diamonds, distinguished ladies and gentlemen. It truly is good to see the world converge in India to discuss an important subject which has impacted several lives both in India, several lives in Africa and businesses around the world, around a subject which, while it’s quite valuable, it’s also glittering, and, probably, one of the most beautiful gifts a man can give to a woman. And I don’t know whether at the end of this function Praveen Bhai is going to gift something to Namita for the successful conclusion and for getting the honorable Prime Minister to address all of you.

But certainly, I didn’t get my wife here today because it’s very dangerous to get wives to a diamond function, seeing all the glittering diamonds that the ladies here would be wearing would be very risky for a humble person like me. But taking a cue from the beautiful book that we just launched, the 2018 Jewellery Trend Book, and I must compliment Miss Metavyas of the NID for putting together some very beautiful concepts of what India can offer. I think we will have to reorient our own industry, our own way of doing business to add a different sort of value to this industry.

I was just listening very carefully to Russell’s very interesting introspective analysis of what’s happening in the industry, and clearly, it has gone through some very good times and is going through some kind of stagnation that was seen in the figures that were presented before us. And, clearly, this reflection is good for every industry. Every industry will need to look at what needs to be done to become more competitive, to add value. And I am delighted that the presentation did not really harp or focus only on what government could do. I think the presentation also brought out a lot of things which will have to be leveraged by Indian industry, by Indian business, to make the industry vibrant once again, growing successfully.

And in that sense, if one hears what the honorable Minister from Zimbabwe said carefully, and I think your Excellency it was a very very impassionate in fact, very compassionate speech from you. You addressed us very emotionally about the role of this industry and about what’s happening in Africa. And I have no doubt in my mind that as the African subcontinent and the African countries rapidly progress in the days and years to come this industry will have an important role to play. I am sure skill development in the African countries, more and more exploration, mining activities in an organized fashion, in a fashion where we do not encourage child labour, in a fashion where we take care of the safety and security of the people engaged in this industry will certainly help the people of Africa improve the quality of life, improve their own future, have a better progress and development for all the people of Africa.

And I can assure you on behalf of all the participants here that India will not be found wanting when it comes to expanding the business with African countries, particularly, with Zimbabwe. We deeply value the strong bonds of friendship and relationship between the two countries. We thank you for your support on several international fora and reassure you that India, Indian companies and Indian people will never ever think of exploiting what is available in Africa. We will only think in terms of supplementing and supporting the great strengths of Africa.

In fact, you are also celebrating 50 years of this Council and almost 19 years since you became an autonomous Council now. It’s been a great journey. You have grown from a very small business of a few million dollars to a multi-billion dollar business, over $24 billion of exports coming only from the diamond sector out of the larger pie of gem and jewellery, and huge amount of value addition. In fact, until Praveen Bhai just told me I honestly thought that the Indian Diamond industry is more about imports and little bit of processing here and exporting it back. The figures just shared with me where you add almost $8 billion of value in India is truly quite impressive. And while Praveen Bhai did highlight to me some of the issues that the industry is grappling with and I am sure your Council will take it up with the honorable Commerce Minister, with the honorable Finance Minister in the days to come.

I do believe that both of us, the industry and government, will have to work in partnership in a spirit of trust and that trust can only be generated out of action. There have been occasions in the past where I have also had a chance to interact with your industry. We have had this discussion about what needs to be done to generate more goodwill about the industry in the corridors of power in government. And, I think opportunities come for the industry to show that they truly believe in the Swaccha Diamond trade that Russell just talked about. And I do hope the industry will not be found wanting when such opportunities are there, when such issues come up. And some of you will understand that I am referring to the demonetization exercise that happened a few months ago. And what happened in the aftermath of that or during that period which has unfortunately led to a situation of not being able to bring in the kind of flexibility and the kind of simplicity in laws that one would have liked to see in the industry.

And I do hope everybody will reflect on it. I do hope the industry participants will also see what needs to be done to once again bring in that element of trust between government, the authorities and the industry. I had raised this issue if you recall when we met in Jaipur. And I don’t know why you still invited me today after all my comments in Jaipur, I would have thought that’s the last time you would ever have me on a function of the gem and jewellery trade. But I do believe that there is a lot we can do together. There’s a lot the government would like to do to promote this industry. You provide more than a million people jobs in Surat alone and …… (speaks in Gujarati).

Of course, because of the swearing-in ceremony in Lucknow, in Uttar Pradesh, he will not be able to join you in person. But I do believe a good programme has been drawn up where he will be interacting with you. And, हीरे की परख तो सिर्फ जोहरी ही जानता है तो मुझे लगता है आपने भी प्रधानमंत्री जी को बहुत समर्थन दिया है, बहुत आशीर्वाद दिया है | वह भी आपको अच्छी तरीके से समझते हैं, आपकी इंडस्ट्री को उन्होंने गुजरात में बहुत सहायता दी थी, बहुत सपोर्ट किया था |

Industry has grown in Gujarat quite significantly in the last few years. So I have no doubt that you will have a lot of sensitive cooperation and support from the government. But, I don’t know, you may also hear a few words from him later in the evening, I don’t know what he is going to talk about. But it’s truly an opportunity where in my own sector, the mining sector, I would urge all of you to look at participating on what we can do to increase the resources and the reserves that India has in the diamond sector. In fact, I was most surprised when I was told that diamonds originated from India as long as 4^th Century BC, so we are really talking of over 2500 years ago when diamonds first originated in India. So the world’s first love for diamonds started in India. And, probably, until the 18^th century, India was the only known source of diamonds. I don’t know whether we landed up exhausting that source but we certainly need to expand our exploration to see whether we can once again get back that pre-eminent position for this industry which we have enjoyed for so many years in the past. अभी तक हम सोने की चिड़िया बोलते थे अभी मुझे आज के बाद लगता है डायमंड की चिड़िया बोलना पड़ेगा भारत को |

In fact, some of our most prized diamonds that came out from the Golconda mines are even today recognized as the diamonds of Golconda, the Kohinoor and the Hope diamond, the Daria-i-Noor diamond. All of these diamonds came in from India, they went all over the world and in our own mythology and culture also we find reference to diamonds. Today, we talk about industrial diamonds in a big way and the strength of the diamonds, the hard capacity that the diamonds have, they were known for their hardness. And probably, in Sanskrit they call it ‘Vajra’, maybe somebody here may like to do some research, but Vajra is the word in Sanskrit for diamonds. And more particularly, because of their hardness and I am given to understand that Lord Indra’s weapons also derived their name from diamonds. The Lord Indra used to use weapons which had diamonds embedded on them for their hardness to be able to attack the enemy. And that Vajra, the weapons of Lord Indra, the word came in from diamond.

So truly you have had a huge role to play in Indian history, in our culture, in our tradition. And now we have an opportunity to further take this engagement to greater heights, even now with almost 70% of the world supply of diamonds in terms of value originating or atleast processed and polished in India. I think we have a great opportunity in India. Praveen Bhai was telling me about some concerns, some constraints that the industry faces even while importing diamonds directly from the African countries in setting up that special zone that was envisaged for diamonds to be brought in directly into India. I see a lot of people probably Europeans from Belgium here so I should not be commenting on our interests to kill the Belgium sector as a conduit to bring diamonds into India. But really, it doesn’t make sense to me why diamonds should have to go to Belgium first and then come to India. Just because of the tax structure or because of the inconsistencies in our own financing methodology. But that’s something which industry, bankers and government should sit down together. I hope the Export Promotion Council will be able to play a role to actually facilitate greater engagement with the African countries and also expanding the scope of the industry in India in the years to come.

The Bharat Diamond bourse has done some good work in the last few years. We are right in the neighbourhood of the bourse, probably, one of the world’s largest diamond exchanges. And it took a lot of painful effort I think Anup Bhai and the whole team working over the years to make that bourse happen. But I have had some good interactions at the bourse in my visits in the past and I am sure, going forward, after the Chief Minister of Maharashtra made the announcements yesterday to help you set up a Jewellery promotion region and help you create more facilities to become a showcase for Indian strengths in the gem and jewellery business. I am sure we can take this business to the next level and, probably, make for the lost years since 2008, which is nearly 10 years of loss time as Russell just highlighted. Let’s all of us work together to change that graph and show it go up rather than stagnate for so many years.

In the mining sector, and I am glad that you are spending this day today to discuss what can be done in the mining sector. I understand that a lot of the large mining companies have concerns about coming to India and setting up business in India. And that emanates from the fact that we do not give a combined prospecting-cum-mining license. The new amendments in the MMDR Act do not permit us to give a license where the person who is exploring for a mine can also exploit that mine, should he find the diamonds. And I do agree that has been the typical way business has happened across the world. But then there are a lot of things we are doing in India differently than what happened in the past, and in many cases successfully. So I think this is another area where India plans to change the rules of the game in terms of exploration.

And I will share with you the reason why this amendment has been done, this change has been done. In fact, it may be interesting for the Minister from Zimbabwe also to consider what implications it has for Africa. The moment we are giving an exploration-cum-mining license, in effect, we are transferring the risk of exploration to the mining company and the upside of getting any diamond reserves or any other mineral reserve being found out of that exploration remains with the mining company for several years thereafter. But in the process, there is a huge ability to game the system, to bring in corruption, to bring in extraneous elements into the system. So when we are giving a license which allows you to prospect and then exploit a particular area, effectively, the government gets the ability to choose who will be given that mine and to choose which will be a potentially good mine, a potentially good reserve area, and give it to a person of choice which could also lead to corruption. And as you are all aware, this government led by Prime Minister Modi, has focused its efforts to eliminate corruption, to eliminate discretion in the working of government. And we would like the entire process to be most transparent and to be in a manner where the benefit of these natural resources, the benefit of whatever natural wealth India has is used to serve the poorest of the poor, to give them a better quality of life and the revenue out of these reserves are expected to work for the benefit of the poor.

And I am going into this detail only because the honorable Minister from Zimbabwe talked about the African countries and about poverty there, and about a better life for the poor of Africa. We have a similar situation in India, the glitz and glamour that you see today does not necessarily reflect the real India that lives in its villages, that lives in the villages of Uttar Pradesh, in the villages of Odisha, in the villages of Jharkhand, or the villages of Chhattisgarh and Madhya Pradesh where most of the diamond mines are also located.

And, therefore, what we plan to do is to have a separate contract for exploration where we will not give the risk to the exploration companies, we will pay for the exploration whatever it costs. An exploration is not a very expensive business. Over the years, the mining companies have on the garb of the risk of exploration probably exploited the places where diamonds were there and used this garb of ‘oh we are taking a very big risk and, therefore, we should have the full right to exploit the mine for 30 years or 50 years or 100 years because we took the risk.’ We are moving that needle. We are saying the government if necessary, will take the risk of exploration. Or we will pay for whatever are the exploration contracts that are given out and we are even going to incentivize the companies which do the exploration work. So should they find diamonds, should they find some good reserves or minerals out of the exploration work, we will give them some incentive for the effort they have put in even beyond their costs, even beyond the cost of exploration.

So we will have two separate contracts, a contract which pays for the exploration. It will have an element of incentive should that exploration come up with a valuable reserve, all the data that comes out of exploration or prospecting will be put transparently in public domain. It will be available for all of you to see what is the findings of that exploration, and then we will have a bidding process where everybody will have a chance to participate, everybody will have a chance to be a part of the exploitation of that reserve. You can study the data that they find out of exploration, you can infer from that what is the potential revenues, what is the potential business, what is the potential value that each of these mining areas has. And why not have some 50 Indian companies also bid for actually exploiting these mines. Why should the world only be exploited by 3 or 4 diamond companies?

And I am glad that an Indian has finally made the effort to takeover, or not takeover, but atleast get involved with one of the world’s large companies in the mining, including the diamond sector. You must have read Vedanta looking at participating in the growth story of De Buers and why should 50 Indian companies not be in this business. Why are you finding yourself dependent only on 3 or 4 large companies, I don’t know whether I am being inappropriate. My apologies if the gentlemen from the WDC or the AWDC do not like what I have said, or the distinguished guests from other centres who may not like some of my comments.

But truly the time has come for India to lead the world and not follow the world. We need not live in the lost glory of 2000 years ago or a 1000 years ago and take happiness and pride in what we were once upon a time. Let’s now plan for the present and the future and make this country what we want it to be. And, therefore, we are going to explore the mineral wealth of this country at cost even with an incentive structure for those who help us in the exploration process. And then we will invite everybody, both Indian and internationally, to come and bid in an honest, transparent bidding process for exploiting those mines. And the revenue that comes out of those mines, out of the bidding process will go to serve the poor of this country, will go to give them a better quality of education, will go to give them electricity, will go to give the poor a decent shelter on their head. And I am sure Praveen Bhai your industry will be happy to be a part of this development of India, this truly inclusive development of all of India.

And I would urge the African countries to also revisit your own way of doing business on the mining sector. Because truly, it pains me and I would like to share with all of you. I go all over the world, we discuss in the United Nations, we discussed in Paris at length, we discussed at Davos about caring for the world, about caring for the developing world, caring for the underdeveloped world and then what do we do? You have these big presentations by developed countries or companies from the developed countries who say, you know look we are giving a million solar lamps to children in Africa, we have brought light into their life. One solar lamp, it costs $10, in fact, $10 is also an exaggerated price, I think if we do it in volume it should cost probably $4 or $5. You give them a $10 solar lamp in a impoverished or a very backward country in Africa and you take pride in yourself that you have brought light into the life of an African. You have given them connectivity. You have given them a solar lamp. And then they say, ‘you know what, we have put up a mobile charging socket so that’s great, we have done two things, we have given them mobile charging and one solar lamp.’

Is that what true development of the world is? I would think if we really want to develop the world, first we stop the waste that is there in the western world. We stop the lights glittering all over the capitals of America and Europe, which waste tonnes and tonnes and thousands and thousands of energy sources leading to all the pollution, all the greenhouses which the world is worried about today. We save all the waste that we see in the developed world and give a good quality life to the people of the world who are left behind in this development process. Not just by giving one solar lamp, but if at all we have to give let’s give them energy access which gives them access to the whole family, which gives them access to have better cooking mediums, which gives them access to lead a better quality of life in terms of healthcare, in terms of education, in terms of adequate supply of electricity, in terms of better sanitation facilities. That’s true inclusive development of the world and I think when we give out these mines through an auction, through a transparent bidding process, that revenue will go to serve the people of India, to serve the poor of India. And that’s the process this country is going to follow.

I would urge even the mining companies which are engaged in mining in a big way internationally to look at participating in both aspects – exploration, prospecting aspects separately through a contract and then to look at mining through efficient, modern methods, to bring that mineral wealth out, make India provider of diamonds to the rest of the world, push up the possibilities of business for your trade and, hopefully, then that $8 billion of value addition that you are doing will become an $18 billion of value addition in the next 5 years and then further grow from there.

We do have 2 operating mines in Madhya Pradesh, but both are in the public sector. To my mind, that’s not the most efficient way of mining. I don’t even know how much of that really is effective, really is efficiently mined. We would like all of you to see how you all can participate in the mining activity, get hold of some experts, get people who understand mining, start setting up units within yourself which can get engaged in exploration of mines. It’s a very simple thing, by the way, extremely simple, it’s just being made complicated by probably propaganda. Exploration is basically drilling activity and nothing else. It’s the interpretation of the findings of that drilling which is probably intelligence or which is probably where real technical knowledge comes in. But we can hire the best in the world, they are available, hire the best in the world for the interpretation of the findings of the exploration. And I would love to see if maybe the next time around you still invite me for a function of GGEPC after all this, I would like you to come and tell that look these are the 40-50 people in India who have decided to get into mining, into exploration, into exploitation of mines and make India truly self-reliant, truly a country where we can say we have not run out of diamonds in the 18^th century, but diamonds are forever in India.

Thank you very much.