For the fifth time since he became the Prime Minister, Narendra Modi celebrated Diwali with jawans of the Indian Armed Forces. This year, the PM also visited the famed Kedarnath temple in Uttarakhand to offer prayers and review the reconstruction work of the shrine which was devastated by the 2013 flash floods.

At around 7.50 am on Wednesday, 7 November, the PM reached Harshil village located at the foot of the mountain that lies at the head of the Baspa Valley in Uttarakhand at the height of around 8,000 feet.

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Joined by Indian Army chief General Bipin Rawat, the PM met soldiers of the Indian Army and the Indo-Tibetan Border Police (ITBP), who guard this stretch of the 3,488 km Sino-India border.

The PM was seen interacting with the jawans posted at Harshil and offering sweets to them as a Diwali gesture.

“Your devotion to duty in the remote icy heights is enabling the strength of the nation, and securing the future and the dreams of 125 crore Indians,” he told the jawans.

“Diwali is the festival of lights which spreads the light of goodness and dispels fear. The jawans, through their commitment and discipline, are also helping to spread the sense of security and fearlessness among the people,” Modi said.

The prime minister said India is taking great strides forward in the defence sector. He spoke of various measures being taken for the welfare of ex-servicemen, including implementation of ‘one rank, one pension’ (OROP).

The prime minister recalled that he has been visiting soldiers on Diwali ever since he was the chief minister of Gujarat. He also spoke of his interactions with the jawans of the Indo-Tibetan Border Police (ITBP), years ago when he was part of the Kailash Mansarovar Yatra.

Modi spent his first Diwali as PM at Siachen with Army jawans in 2014. The next year, he had visited the Punjab border on Diwali coinciding with 50 years of the 1965 Indo-Pak war. In 2016, Modi was in Himachal Pradesh, where he celebrated the festival with personnel of ITBP at a border outpost. Last year, the PM was in Jammu-Kashmir’s Gurez where he met Indian Army soldiers.

Before leaving, the PM posed for a group photograph with the personnel of the armed forces against a backdrop of the Himalayas.

From Harshil, the PM flew to the Kedarnath shrine. The path to the temple from the VIP helipad was recently cleared of snow.

The PM was seen offering prayers at the temple, which was decked up for his visit. This was his third visit to Kedarnath since October 2017 and second time in the last six months.

“Overwhelmed at the darshan of Baba Kedarnath,” the PM wrote on Twitter. “I prayed for the continuous progress of the country and for peace, prosperity and happiness in the lives of people,” he added ending his tweet with ‘Jai Baba Kedarnath’.

बाबा केदारनाथ के दर्शन का सौभाग्य पाकर अभिभूत हूं।

मैंने महादेव से देश की निरंतर प्रगति और सभी देशवासियों के सुख, शांति और समृद्धि की कामना की है।

जय बाबा केदारनाथ ! pic.twitter.com/IlyPJ7pcsi

— Narendra Modi (@narendramodi) November 7, 2018

The Prime Minister, who has taken personal interest in the reconstruction, went around the temple complex to take a stock of the work.

Modi is also scheduled to watch a video presentation prepared by the state government officials on the reconstruction work of the guesthouse near the shrine.