NEW DELHI: Infrastructure development in the country’s border areas in the last six years of the Narendra Modi government has been much more than in the previous 50 years, Union Home Minister Amit Shah said on Thursday.
Citing the airstrikes and surgical strike, Shah claimed India is now giving a befitting reply to enemies rather than the past practice of just issuing a “diplomatic statement”.
The Home Minister was addressing a gathering at the Simant Kshetra Vikasotsav-2020 at Dhordo village in Gujarat’s Kutch district as part of the Centre’s Border Area Development Programme.
Sarpanches (village heads) along with other elected representatives of Kutch, Banaskantha and Patan districts, which share land border with Pakistan, were present at the event.
Shah said the government under PM Narendra Modi is committed to develop areas situated along India’s border.
Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel (India’s first home minister) had stressed on stopping migration and providing water, electricity to the border villages.
But the Congress governments did not implement it, Shah said, stressing that Modi has taken up that task to fulfil what Patel wanted.
It is necessary to stop the migration of people from border areas. To do so, those areas must be developed at par with cities, Shah said.