Governance reimagined since 2014: PM Modi at ET GBS

The mantra of reimagining and reinventing the approach to governance and meeting the major challenges facing the country, be it poverty, corruption, policy paralysis or cronyism, has been the hallmark of his government, Prime Minister Narendra Modi said on Friday.

Addressing the seventh edition of the Economic Times Global Business Summit in the Capital , the Prime Minister said previous dispensations were aware of people’s problems but had a “mai-baap” attitude toward them. Echoing the theme of the summit — Reimagine Business, Reimagine the World — he said his government had transformed the lives of the poor and the weaker sections through honest and prompt delivery of welfare schemes.

Without naming anyone, he also took a dig at opinion makers who have tried to “launch, relaunch, re-relaunch” a product (read leader) without using any reimagination. Modi also recalled his participation at the last GBS on March 6, 2020, and how the world was engulfed by the Covid pandemic just five days later. He underlined that India had proved to the world what it means to be “anti-fragile” by the way it fought the pandemic and vaccinated people.


“When the country gave us an opportunity to serve in 2014, the first step we took was to reimagine the approach to issues,” the PM said. “We decided to reimagine, reinvent every single element of governance after 2014. The country’s reputation was at stake. We reimagined how the government can improve welfare delivery to empower the poor. We reimagined how the government can create infrastructure in a more efficient way. We reimagined the kind of relationship the government should have with the citizens of the country.”

Previous governments were afflicted by scams, cronyism, project delays due to policy paralysis and a lacklustre approach to governance, said the PM. The reimagination in dealing with the delivery of welfare schemes led to the opening of (Jan Dhan) bank accounts, Mudra loans, home ownership, construction of toilets, electricity and clean cooking fuel (LPG cylinders), he said.

Previous governments came up with the “garibi hatao” slogan but did not find ways to achieve poverty alleviation, he said. Recalling the remark of former Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi that only 15 paise of every rupee sanctioned by the government reached the poor, Modi said Direct Benefit Transfer (DBT) ensured 100% delivery of the amount to the intended beneficiary. “I don’t know which panja (hand, alluding to the Congress symbol) siphoned off the fund,” he said.

“Our government has so far transferred Rs 28 lakh crore via DBT under different schemes. If Rajiv Gandhi's remark had remained true even today, then 85%, or Rs 24 lakh crore, would have been looted. But today it is reaching the poor,” the Prime Minister said.

Modi said Jawaharlal Nehru had stated that the country will reach the real heights of development the day Indian households have a toilet facility but the issue was not resolved till his government assumed office. More than 100 million toilets have been constructed since 2014, taking sanitation coverage from below 40% to 100% in rural areas.

Aspirational districts were another consequence of reimagining the approach to dealing with backward districts. There were 100 backward districts where there was rampant poverty and backwardness. They lacked roads, clean drinking water, electricity, and educational and health facilities. Most of these were in tribal areas. This change in attitude led to the posting of bright young officers in these districts — earlier these were considered punishment postings — and these areas saw a transformation. He listed several such districts in the country where immunisation, TB treatment, broadband connectivity to gram panchayats, tap water supply and other facilities have been provided.

The Modi government also reimagined infrastructure development and replaced the earlier approach of building roads and running trains keeping vote banks and political dividends in mind. “We stopped the practice of viewing infrastructure in silos and reimagined infrastructure building as a grand strategy,” he said. “Today, highways are being built in India at a speed of 38 km per day and more than 5 km of rail lines are being laid every day. Our port capacity is going to reach 3,000 mtpa in the coming two years. Compared to 2014, the number of operational airports has doubled from 74 to 147. In these nine years, about 3.5 lakh km of rural roads and 80,000 km of national highways have been built. In these nine years, houses of 3 crore poor have been built.”

Similarly, metro rail lines have been laid at a rapid speed, a big change from 1984 to 2014, when an average of only half a km of line was laid every month. “Today it has increased to 6 km per month and India stands at number five in terms of metro route length and soon India will be number three in the world,” he said. The Prime Minister also underlined the reimagination harnessed in launching the PM Gati Shakti National Master Plan.

Over 1,600 plus data layers of infrastructure mapping are available on the Gati Shakti platform. India’s expressways or other infrastructure have also been linked to AI to decide the shortest and most efficient route,” Prime Minister Narendra Modi said. In the aviation sector, 128 air routes that were earlier restricted for defence have now been opened up for civilian traffic, leading to saving of time and fuel as well as reducing 100,000 tonnes of CO2 emissions. Other achievements include laying more than 600,000 km of optical fibre in the country, increasing mobile manufacturing manifold, and the cheapest data services in the world. He also noted that 40% of the world's real-time digital payments take place in India.

Taking a potshot at his political opponents, the PM said earlier governments had the attitude of being the masters of citizens, which led to a situation in which the people were regarded with suspicion no matter what they did. Excessive red tape stopped citizens from freely using their potential. The reforms of the 1990s were forced by circumstances and the “mai-baap mentality” did not disappear completely.

“After 2014, the ‘government-first’ mentality was reimagined as a ‘people-first’ approach and the government worked on the principle of trusting its citizens,” Modi said. Abig jump in number of taxpayers in the country is one of the outcomes of this approach, he asserted. “The country’s gross tax revenue was approximately Rs 11 lakh crore in 2013-14, but in 2023-24 it is estimated to be more than Rs 33 lakh crore,” he said.

“In nine years, the gross tax revenue has increased by three times and this has happened when we have reduced the tax rates.” The Prime Minister also referred to the G20 presidentship and the theme of “One World, One Family, One Future” and emphasised that the world can become a better place by finding common resolutions and respecting everybody’s interests. “People trust you when you trust them,” the Prime Minister said.