New Delhi, November 15
Prime Minister Manmohan Singh today called for reducing the rural-urban divide and stressed that rural India must catch up with the best of infrastructure as in urban areas.
The Prime Minister also called for an all out effort to win the “war against poverty, ignorance and disease” in rural areas for the creation of a new India.“The physical and social infrastructure in rural India must catch up with at least semi-urban India within the next decade,” Dr Singh said in his address at the Leadership Summit organised by The Hindustan Times, here.
The two-day conclave, which began here today, will explore various ideas for ‘Building a Better Future’ for the country and the world.
“The growth process of the last century has left village India far behind our big cities. This divide must not widen any further,” the Prime Minister said.
“Be it sanitation, drinking water, electricity and roads, education and health, public spaces and the environment — whatever be the criterion, rural India deserves better,” he said.
The objective of Bharat Nirman, a time-bound business plan for rural infrastructure development launched by the government, is to bridge the gap, he said.
“We have a comprehensive, overarching vision of what we need and must do for our rural areas. Along with Bharat Nirman, we have also launched various initiatives for rural and agricultural development, including the National Rural Health Mission, and have provided increased funding for Sarva Shiksha Abhiyan,” thge PM said.
However, these programmes should not be just budgetary initiatives aimed at investing more money, he said.
The PM said any government, irrespective of political ideology, “required in a complex polity like ours, to walk on two legs to take the nation forward”.
He said the government had to pursue policies that addressed the need for equity and social justice, and at the same time, also take steps to meet the demands of efficiency and enterprise.
“If we do not pay attention to the questions of equity and social justice and allow only market forces and individual enterprise to thrive, we will be pursuing a socially and politically unsustainable path of development,” Dr Singh said.
Outlining the vision for the country, Dr Singh insisted that bureaucracy and corruption must not come
in the way of "Indians ready to take on the world”.
The PM said too many rules and restrictions were shackling many Indians who wanted to “compete globally, to test their skills and sell their wares on the global stage.”
“We have to enable them to realise their full potential. We must not prevent the full flowering of the creativity, enterprise and talent of our professionals, our entrepreneurs, our artists and our skilled workers,” he added.
