Amit Shah congratulates PM Modi for designation of 'International Yoga Day'

Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) president Amit Shah on Friday congratulated Prime Minister Narendra Modi after the United Nations took forward the latter's proposal and designated June 21 as 'International Yoga Day'.

"When Prime Minister Narendra Modi had addressed the United Nations General Assembly (UNGA) earlier this year, he had proposed the designation of June 21, the longest day of the year, to be observed as 'International Yoga Day'. I am happy to say that more than 170 countries in the world have agreed, and the UN has resolved to recognise that day," Shah said at a press conference here.

"I want to congratulate the Prime Minister for this initiative. This is a great achievement for India," he added.

In Raipur on the occasion of Dr Raman Singh completing 11 years as Chief Minister of Chhattisgarh, Shah stated that his party had taken concrete steps towards fulfilling every issue that had been discussed prior to the Lok Sabha elections.

"The Prime Minister Modi-led government has completed six months at the Centre and I believe that we have taken concrete steps towards each and every issue that we had touched upon when we were campaigning for the Lok Sabha elections. We have brought down the price of petrol and diesel nine times since coming to power. We have brought down the rate of inflation from 7.24 percent to 1.77 percent," he stated.

"The 'Make in India' initiative is gathering steam - only yesterday, the visiting Russian President Vladimir Putin stated that he would like to manufacture helicopters here. The initiative will not only increase our GDP, it will also help with reducing unemployment," he added.

Shah also mentioned other schemes and programmes that the Prime Minister Modi-led government had started since coming to power.

"We have also started the 'Skills Development' programme and have given it vital importance by assigning it the designation of a ministry, so that the youth can be employed fruitfully in the production of goods in the 'Make in India' initiative," he said.

"Another successful scheme that Prime Minister Modi introduced is the 'Jan Dhan Yojana', which has seen around seven crore people have a bank account. As far as black money is concerned, the people who are raising that issue in the Parliament today took no steps to bring it back in the ten years that they were in power," he added.

The BJP chief also mentioned other initiatives like the 'Smart Cities' project, the 'Swachh Bharat Abhiyan' and the advance in defence projects.