Prime Minister NarendraModi Saturday said the goal of making India a USD 5 trillion economy by 2024 is challenging but surely achievable, as he asked states to focus on their core competencies and work towards increasing the GDP right from the district level.
In his inaugural address at the fifth meeting of theGoverning Council of NITI Aayog here, the prime minister also underlined theneed for taking effective steps to tackle drought in various parts of thecountry.
The meeting is being attended by senior union ministers andalmost all the chief ministers, except Mamata Banerjee (West Bengal) and K ChandrashekharRao(Telangana). Punjab Chief Minister Amarinder Singh who could attend the meetingdue health reasons deputed his finance minister ManpreetBadal.
Banerjee had earlier said she would not attend the meetingsaying NitiAayog is a “fruitless” body as it has no financial powers.Rao did not come as he was busy with preparations for the launch of theambitious Rs 80,000 croreKaleshwaram lift irrigation project that would endwater woes in the state.
According to an official release, Modi recalled the recentGeneral Elections as the world’s largest democratic exercise and said that itis now time for everyone to work for the development of India. He spoke of acollective fight against poverty, unemployment, drought, flood, pollution,corruption and violence.The prime minister said that everyone has acommon goal of achieving a New India by 2022. He described Swachh BharatAbhiyan and PM AwaasYojana as illustrations of what the Centre and the statescan accomplish together.