BELAGAVI: Prime Minister Narendra Modi, who was on a visit to poll-bound Karnataka, held a roadshow in Belagavi on Monday.
People queued up on both sides of the roads through which the Prime Minister’s cavalcade passed and cheered for him. Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) workers welcomed PM Modi by showering petals on his convoy. Cultural dance performances were also organised alongside the road.
After the roadshow, Prime Minister Modi held a public rally where he laid the foundation stone and inaugurated multiple development projects worth more than Rs 2,700 crore in Belagavi.
He released the 13th installment amounting to about Rs 16,000 crore under PM-KISAN Yojana. The Prime Minister dedicated the redeveloped Belagavi Railway Station building to the nation. He also laid the foundation stone of six multi-village scheme projects under Jal Jeevan Mission.
Addressing the rally, Modi came down heavily on Congress and said the people of the country will give a befitting reply to the party which curses him to death. “Congress thinks that until Modi is, alive their motives will not survive and that is why they all are saying ‘mar ja Modi, mar ja Modi’. And, some are saying ‘Modi teri kabar khudegi’, but the country is saying ‘Modi tera Kamal khilega’.
Taking a dig at the Congress, PM said that Mallikarjun Kharge is only a namesake president of the party as the world is aware who has the “remote control” of the party. “I respect Mallikarjun Kharge ji a lot… Congress session was going on now. He is the most senior. Mallikarjun Kharge has served the public in whatever way possible. It was sunny, but Kharge ji did not get an umbrella as it was meant for someone else. I was disheartened to see how the most senior leader, the president of the Congress, was disrespected by them. The world knows who has the remote control”, he said.
Since 2014, the Prime Minister said, the country is continuously moving towards a meaningful change in agriculture. “We are connecting agriculture with modernity”, he said. “We have transferred Rs 16,000 crore to farmers across the country and eliminated the middlemen. Had it been Congress’ rule, over Rs 12,000-13,000 crore would have been lost out of Rs 16,000 crore”, he said.
In 2014, Modi said India’s budget for agriculture was Rs 25,000 crore. He said the government have increased it to Rs 1.25 lakh crore in this year’s budget. He said small farmers, who were neglected for decades, are the priority of the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) government. So far, Rs 2.5 lakh crore has been deposited through PM Kisan Samman Nidhi in the accounts of farmers, he pointed out.
Earlier on Monday, PM Modi laid the foundation stone and inaugurated multiple development projects worth more than Rs 3,600 crore at Shivamogga. He also inaugurated the Shivamogga Airport and took a walk-through of the facilities.
The Prime Minister also laid the foundation stone for two railway projects in Shivamogga which include Shivamogga-Shikaripura-Ranebennur new railway line and Koteganguru railway coaching depot.
He laid the foundation stone for multiple road development projects, to be developed at a cumulative cost of more than Rs 215 crore. He also inaugurated and laid the foundation stone of multi-village schemes worth more than Rs 950 crore under the Jal Jeevan Mission. He also inaugurated 44 Smart City Projects worth more than Rs 895 Crores in Shivamogga city. (ANI)