PM Modi asks NDA MPs to hold ‘Swadeshi Mela’, says self-reliance to power India’s rise

Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Monday asked the ruling NDA MPs to organise ‘Swadeshi Mela’ to promote indigenous products and make it a mass movement, stressing that self-reliance is the way to power India’s rise when its increasing strength is bound to face some challenges.

Addressing the MPs a day before the Vice Presidential election, Modi kept the focus on the need for promoting made-in-India products and taking to the masses the wide impact of the GST rate cuts by holding meetings with people and traders in their constituencies, especially during the festival season between Navratri and Diwali, sources said.

Union Minister Kiren Rijiju later said that Modi was not referring to any country, while emphasising the need for self-reliance.

“The Prime Minister said that some challenges will come up when India is emerging as a strong nation and it needs to be ‘aatmanirbhar’ (self-reliant) to continue on the path to become a developed nation,” he said.

Amid a strain in ties with the US following President Donald Trump’s decision to impose a high 50 per cent tariff on India, Modi has turned up his “swadeshi” pitch even though he has been emphasising on it for a long time.

He asked the MPs to hold fairs to promote made-in-India products in their constituencies, urging them to take a leadership role for this. People should feel as proud for owning made-in-India products as they used to at one point of time about Japanese items, he added.

“Swadeshi” should be a part of every programme they attend, he said.

Modi said the GST rate cuts have triggered a “lehar” (wave) among people, but MPs needs to build on it by holding “swadeshi mela” and “vyapari sammelan” (meetings with traders).

The PM, a source said, gave an example by noting that even if a storm is blowing, one needs to pump air in their vehicle’s tyres. In the same way, one has to work on the ground to take the message forward despite a favourable atmosphere.

Turning to the vice presidential election, he asked MPs to ensure that they vote correctly, noting that it does not send out a good message when parliamentarians make a mistake in polling.

A mock polling session was held to ensure that MPs know the correct way of casting their ballot in an election held on single transferable vote.

NDA vice presidential candidate CP Radhakrishnan, whose win is all but certain as numbers favour him, was present in the meeting, with Modi also greeting nonagenarian JD(S) leader and former prime minister HD Devegowda, who attended the programme along with other BJP allies.

NDA sources said their alliance has 427 MPs, while the opposition has 315 MPs. There are 39 MPs who are unaligned to the two main blocks. Among them, the YSR Congress has announced its support to Radhakrishnan and AIMIM’s sole member Asaduddin Owaisi has pledged his vote to the opposition’s B Sudershan Reddy.

Rijiju expressed confidence that most of the 39 MPs will vote for Radhakrishnan, whom he described as a “nationalist and a very good person”. Two other unaligned parties, BJD and BRS, have announced that they will abstain from voting.

Modi is likely to be the first voter on Tuesday and will leave on a tour of the flood-affected states of Punjab and Himachal Pradesh afterwards.

In his speech, the PM also asked parliamentarians to highlight the positive effects of a recent law passed by the Parliament banning online games involving money.

These games were destroying so many lives, and the government’s decision will help a huge number of families across the country but it has not received adequate attention, he said.