Prime Minister Narendra Modi will start his second stint not with a 100-day agenda, but a 1,000-day agenda that will run up to the first half of 2022, the 75th anniversary of India’s independence, two people with direct knowledge of the matter said on condition of anonymity.
The plan will include several initiatives, from empowering women in agriculture to sending an Indian into space, as Modi seeks to fulfil his promise of creating a “New India” in his second term, they added.
“We have been directed to chalk out agenda for the first 1,000 days and the new ministers and department heads will have to frame a comprehensive strategy to meet these objectives by 2022,” said one of the people cited in the first instance, who works in a key government department.
A continuing emphasis on inclusive social welfare programmes, under the umbrella of “Antodaya” (upliftment of the poor), will run through the plan, the first person added. The emphasis on similar programmes, which benefited 220 million people (by the government’s own count), is believed to be one of the factors responsible for the National Democratic Alliance’s (NDA) re-election.
Modi is understood to have directed his officials to go beyond the routine 100-day agenda and, instead, work on a comprehensive three-year strategy.
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“The departments have been asked not to wait for the constitution of the new government, but to act immediately. After council of ministers is constituted, and portfolios allocated, they will start implementing the strategies in a mission mode, without wasting any time,” the second person said.
On Thursday, addressing party workers at the BJP headquarters soon after the election results came out, Prime Minister Modi said: “For the next five years, every Indian will have to pledge to transform India into a strong nation. The mission will require the same spirit as the one witnessed during the freedom struggle. We can make India a strong nation by 2022, before we complete 75 years of Independence.”
On Friday morning, BJP president Amit Shah met key ministers and told them to focus on fulfilling the agenda for 2022 with all seriousness, HT learns. “The new government is in no mood to waste any time and wants to act from day one,” the second person said.
Some of the key schemes that will figure in the 1,000-day plan are: doubling farmer’s income by 2022; setting up 40,000 MW rooftop solar projects ; housing for all; generating 100 GW solar energy; empowering women including farm workers, and launching India’s first manned space mission, according to government officials who are working on Mission New India, as the plan is being tentatively called.
According to the officials, security to migrant labourers and factory workers is also a top priority, and the government’s effort will be to cover 100 million workers in the Employees’ State Insurance Scheme by 2022. There will also be programmes that build on Digital India, an e-governance programme of the first Modi government, and a focus on science and technology and healthcare, they added.
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