Information and Broadcasting Minister Anurag Thakur on Tuesday addressed FICCI’s National Conclave on Viksit Bharat@ 2047: Viksit Bharat & Industry and exhorted industry leaders to forge partnerships with those seeking to invest in India.

Industry should exploit India’s talents and capabilities that will contribute majorly to India’s transformation into a Viksit Bharat, he said.

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Mr Thakur expressed his gratitude to taxpayers and said that it is because of the honest tax payers that the Government has been able to direct every penny of the corpus thus collected towards the social sector.

Earlier only a fraction of the allocated money was reaching the intended beneficiaries, but today the Government has ensured that all the money released by it, reaches the recipients directly in their bank accounts, he said.

Citing UPI as an example of the resolve of the Government to deliver on its promises, he said that there were a lot of doubts about its effectiveness when it was launched.

Today, UPI has penetrated all sections of society and all corners of the country, he said. “Today 46 per cent of all digital payments in the world are made in India and the world is looking up to us for our technological prowess,” he said.

Listing the major achievements of the Government towards betterment of life of the poor, the Minister said 40 million houses, 100 million toilets, over 100 million LPG cylinders have been provided, while over 130 million tap water connections have been installed.

There are over 600 million Ayushman Bharat beneficiaries and over 800 million people are receiving free food, he said.

Mr Thakur underlined the Government’s focus on infrastructure development in the country over the last 10 years and said that national highway construction has gone from 90,000 kilometers to 150 thousand kilometers, the number of airports has doubled from 74 to 150, the number of AIIMS has gone up from seven to 23 and IITs from 12 to 19 while the length of rural roads has doubled.

These, along with other measures, have placed India in the top five economies of the world today, he said.

Crediting Prime Minister Narendra Modi for giving a strong and capable leadership to the country, the Minister said that today the heft of Indian passports has increased abroad and India has intervened in raging conflicts to extract its own people.

Mr Thakur said that while in the farm sector the Government has delivered on the promise of cost plus 50 percent, domestic industries are growing at a fast pace with Government support. He said that in the last 10 years the Government has laid the foundation that will take the country on the path of becoming a developed nation by 2047.