PM Modi had promised to build 100 smart cities by 2022. During the first term of the Modi government, the project of making 100 cities of the country smart cities had been in the headlines.
With less than a year left before the general elections of 2024, India would witness more than half a dozen elections which would set the momentum for the big battle. And with every new election comes new promises.
The BJP is often looked upon as an election machine that takes every election as its fight for survival. Prime Minister Modi being the prime star campaigner of the party often launch various welfare schemes, inaugurates, and lay foundation stones of various projects just ahead of polls.
However, many of the flagship schemes promised that delivery will be completed by 2022. Now we are in 2023. But there are some big announcements of PM Modi which have not been completed to date.
Let’s have a look at 5 such announcements:
- Bullet Train: Bullet train has been at the top of the promises of PM Modi. In 2018, PM Modi said that by 2022 the bullet train will be a reality in India, that is, the bullet train will start running. After this its date was changed to December 2023. On the other hand, in August 2022, the Ministry of Railways informed Via tweet that now only 22 percent of work has been done, and so far only land acquisition is going on. According to Wikipedia, it may take up to 2028 to start the bullet train from Mumbai to Surat, while it is expected to start from Bilmore to Surat by 2026. Covid is being cited as the reason for its delay.
2)100 smart cities by 2022:
PM Modi had promised to build 100 smart cities by 2022. During the first term of the Modi government, the project of making 100 cities of the country smart cities had been in the headlines.
In response to a question raised in the Lok Sabha, the Central Government had told that there is an effort to make the cities smart cities within five years from the date of their selection, but till date those efforts are only on paper. If one asks what happened to the promise, the answer is that the process has started to make a smart city, but neither the budget has been allocated nor any layout has been done.
3) Pucca house to everyone by 2022:
During the 2019 Lok Sabha elections, PM Narendra Modi had taken a pledge in public meetings at various places that if he becomes the Prime Minister of the country again, in 2022, when the country is celebrating its 75th year of independence, there will not be a single family that does not have a pucca house of its own. The year 2022 has ended and the country has also celebrated the Amrit Mahotsav of Independence, but the promise of Pucca houses to everyone has not been fulfilled. A pucca house for all was not just an election promise of the Prime Minister but also a target of the Pradhan Mantri Awas Yojana. It cannot be said to what extent this target will be fulfilled in 2023 also.
4)24 Hours Electricity For All:
In 2015, Prime Minister Narendra Modi had said that by 2022, that is, when the country will celebrate the 75th anniversary of independence, all the states of the country will have electricity for 24 hours every day, but this promise has also not been fulfilled. Even today load shedding is common in many areas of the country.
5) Promise to clean Ganga by 2022:
After coming to power in 2014, the Modi government said that cleaning Ganga is its top priority and for this, a scheme named Namami Gange was announced, whose objective was to reverse the deteriorating quality of Ganga river water. It promised to reduce pollution and deteriorating quality. However, the work on it started only after the order in 2016, October. From the financial year 2014-15 to 2020-2021, under this Namami Gange scheme, a roadmap was created to spend Rs 20 thousand crore first, which was later increased to Rs 30 thousand crore. However, out of this approved budget, only about 50 percent of the budget has been allocated. On July 22, 2022, the NGT in its order said that the environmental flow of the Ganga has also slowed down significantly. This also remained a promising project on paper.
There are several other promises like CAA, NRC, and UCC which were part of the BJP’s manifesto but are yet to be implemented.
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