‘Our government brought down the wall of Article 370,’ says PM Modi at Rashtriya Prerna Sthal inauguration

Prime Minister Narendra Modi

Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Thursday said his government dismantled the wall of Article 370 to strengthen national unity, asserting that the ideological foundation for the move was laid decades ago by Syama Prasad Mukherjee.

He was addressing a public gathering after inaugurating the Rashtriya Prerna Sthal on the occasion of the 101st birth anniversary of former prime minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee.

The Rashtriya Prerna Sthal has been developed in the Vasant Kunj area as a national memorial to honour the legacy of great personalities of independent India. Modi said the site symbolises an ideology that showed the nation the path of self-respect and service. He noted that the land on which the memorial has been built had remained a garbage dump for decades and congratulated all those involved in transforming it.

Referring to the abrogation of Article 370, the Prime Minister said there cannot be two flags and two constitutions in one country and added that India is bound together by a single thread of unity. He said the BJP takes pride in carrying forward the ideas of Mukherjee and implementing them.

Modi said Made in India products are now reaching markets across the world and highlighted the large defence corridor being developed in Uttar Pradesh. He said India’s defence capabilities are being strengthened and cited Operation Sindoor as an example. The Prime Minister said the world witnessed the power of the BrahMos missile during the operation and noted that the missile is being manufactured in Lucknow, calling it a symbol of India’s technological and industrial strength.

Targeting the opposition, Modi said there had been a mindset of associating every major development work with a single family. He said roads, statues and even neighbourhoods were named after members of the same family. The Prime Minister said the BJP freed the country from family-centric politics and pointed out that statues of Netaji Subhas Chandra Bose are now being installed at several places, which he said was not the case during Congress rule.

Modi accused the Samajwadi Party and the Congress of attempting to sideline Dr B R Ambedkar, the chief architect of the Constitution. He alleged that a powerful family in Delhi avoided acknowledging Ambedkar to protect its own prominence, while a similar approach was followed by the Samajwadi Party in Uttar Pradesh. He said both parties failed to give Ambedkar the respect he deserved.

Highlighting welfare initiatives, the Prime Minister said earlier bank accounts and insurance coverage were limited to a few sections of society. He said more than 25 crore poor people are now covered under the Pradhan Mantri Jeevan Jyoti Yojana, while around 55 crore people are enrolled under accident insurance schemes. According to him, nearly Rs 25,000 crore has been disbursed to beneficiary families through these schemes.

On infrastructure development, Modi said nearly eight lakh kilometres of rural roads have been constructed since 2000, with around four lakh kilometres built in the last ten years. He said expressway projects are underway across the country and Uttar Pradesh has emerged as a leading state in expressway construction. Recalling Vajpayee’s contribution, Modi said it was the former prime minister who initiated the Delhi Metro project, adding that metro networks are now easing daily life in several cities, including those in Uttar Pradesh where projects are progressing rapidly.