Vice-President Jagdeep Dhankhar on Tuesday made an appeal to the youth of the country to use every medium to generate public opinion for impressing upon parliamentarians that their conduct must make every countryman proud.

”We don’t want our boys and girls to follow disruption, we don’t want them to appreciate shouting slogans, showing placards (in the House),” he said at a function in Bengaluru on the birth centenary celebration of Dr. M S Ramaiah.

”Lakhs & crores are spent for every minute of Rajya Sabha. With disruption, you cannot control the government system.  Rajya Sabha is the platform to hold the government accountable to hold the executive accountable. There has to be a mass movement. I appeal to young minds. We are there in (the) Rajya Sabha and Parliament to facilitate that destination of the nation is on right track. We have to exemplify our conduct which everyone can emulate, which everyone can follow,” said Dhankhar, who is also the Chairman of the Upper House.

Echoing the sentiments of Prime Minister Narendra Modi, he said this was not an era of expansion and war was not a solution to any problem. India, he said, was perhaps the only country that historically has never taken recourse to expansion.

The vice president said India was on the rise as never before and the rise of India was unstoppable. The entire world was recognizing it. ”We have become a prime destination of investment and opportunity among the large economies of the world,” he added, pointing out that India recently earned the distinction of being the fifth largest economy. ”Thanks to visionary steps affirmative governmental policies at all levels, there is no doubt that by the turn of the decade, we will be the third largest economy on the planet.”

He called upon everybody here to take pride in being Indians. ”We must always keep our nation first. We must be proud of our achievements,” he added.

Talking about Covid and the challenge posed by it to humanity, he recalled that people were worried about how a country like India would be able to meet the challenge. But the same people were now asking “How did India do it? How did India do so successfully?” He noted that 220 crore vaccination doses were given to all citizens free and all digitally mapped. ”This has not happened even in the West and this is on account of our people, our policies, and the vision of our leadership,” he added.