PM wields broom, sweeps away a fear - Calcutta Telegraph

Modi during a cleanliness drive as part of his Swachh Bharat campaign in Varanasi. (PTI)

Varanasi, Dec. 25: Narendra Modi today picked up a broom again, read out a new list of his Clean India ambassadors, launched a teacher education mission and confessed to a “love” that “nobody”, he asserted, could match.

The last bit came at a railway event where he ruled out privatising the cash-strapped utility before the multi-tasking Prime Minister wrapped up a daylong trip to his constituency Varanasi.

The assurance came on a day the government celebrated Atal Bihari Vajpayee’s birthday as Good Governance Day, and a day after the former Prime Minister and the BJP’s original national mascot was honoured with the Bharat Ratna, the country’s highest civilian award.

“Those who are saying the railways are being privatised are spreading lies…,” Modi said as he flagged off a locomotive engine that had been 96 per cent indigenously built. “The railways have shaped my life, nobody can love it more than me.”

The Prime Minister said it was “neither his wish nor intention” to privatise the public transporter.

The emphatic statement was meant to allay fears voiced by trade unions and some politicians who said the government’s decision to attract foreign direct investment in railways was a step towards privatising the network.

The Union cabinet, in August this year, allowed 100 per cent FDI in development of railway infrastructure. However, foreign funds are not allowed in core railway operations.

“I want to ask the union leaders how is it worrying if funds come in pounds and dollars,” Modi said, adding that he was seeking foreign investment as he didn’t want domestic funds, meant for the poor, to revive the railways.

Modi pays homage before a statue of Madan Mohan Malaviya in Varanasi. (AFP)

“How many years shall we be putting the money of the poor in railways?” he said. “We should invest if we are getting money from the rich.”

Modi laid the foundation stone for a project to expand the locomotive building unit and spelt out his vision to set up four railway universities spread across the four regions of the country to produce skilled manpower.

What is wrong in taking money from Japan and China for the project, he asked the crowd, mostly railway employees.

Earlier in the day, the Prime Minister took up the broom at a Varanasi ghat in another push for his Swachh Bharat (Clean India) mission.

Modi, who had earlier picked up the broom on October 2, when he had launched the mission, headed straight to “Assi Ghat” on the banks of the Ganga to review the work on cleaning silt.

He announced nine more names, including that of cricketer Sourav Ganguly and Mumbai “dabba walas”, as ambassadors of the government’s campaign.

Between the swish of the broom and the bid to sweep away fears of privatisation, Modi visited Banaras Hindu University (BHU) to launch a mission to produce quality teachers.

BHU was Modi’s first stop of the day after he landed in his Uttar Pradesh constituency around noon. From the airport he had taken a helicopter to the university before garlanding a statue of the late BHU founder Madan Mohan Malaviya near the campus.

Malaviya, a freedom fighter, was also honoured with the Bharat Ratna yesterday.

After garlanding the statue, Modi had left for Assi ghat. He then came back to BHU, where he inaugurated a teachers’ training institution and W-Fi facility on the campus.

The Madan Mohan Malaviya National Mission on Teachers and Teaching, which Modi launched today, is aimed at addressing issues of both quality and quantity at a time five lakh teaching posts are vacant in elementary schools, while around seven lakh teachers don’t have any formal training.

Some 30 to 40 per cent teaching posts are vacant in higher education institutions.

The mission takes forward what the UPA government’s National Mission on Teachers and Teaching (NMTT) had envisaged in 2012.

The Malaviya mission is being started with an outlay of Rs 900 crore for the 2012-17 plan.

It would address issues like the gap between availability of and the demand for qualified teachers, attracting talent into the profession and raising the quality of teaching in schools and colleges.