On the occasion of his government's 4.5-year anniversary on Sunday, Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath outlined the state's accomplishments at an event held in Lucknow.
The event, dubbed 'Vikas Utsav' and with the tagline "Soch Imaandaar, Kam Damdaar...Chha Gayi Yogi Sarkaar," was also attended by BJP vice-president and UP in charge Radha Mohan Singh and UP BJP chief Swatantra Dev Singh.
In a rebuttal to the opposition, the CM defended his government with a firm assertion about managing the two waves of the Corona pandemic, despite the fact that many other states were experiencing a resurgence of new cases.
Yogi did not pass up the opportunity to criticise the opposition parties for avoiding Hindu religious sites such as Ayodhya and Mathura for fear of being labelled as "communal." "However, the BJP did not believe this and organised events that marked the religious and cultural identities of the places," he explained.
Yogi also launched a scathing attack on the previous SP government, claiming that this is the same UP where criminals and mafia dons received political support and riots occurred every fourth day. "Now, there are no riots, and criminals face the wrath of the government," he said, highlighting his government's accomplishment of seizing illegally occupied land worth nearly Rs 1,800 crores.
Among all states in the country, UP is ranked first in the implementation of 44 central schemes, according to the CM. He went on to say that the state government had launched the Mission Shakti programme to ensure women's safety and empowerment.
Yogi stated that in the last 4.5 years, the state has provided free power connections to 1.38 crore poor people and built 2.61 crore toilets.
He also chastised the previous CM's for competing to build large bungalows for themselves while ignoring the people's basic needs. "But we did not build houses for ourselves, but for as many as 42 lakh people," Yogi said, a clear dig at SP chief Akhilesh Yadav and BSP chief Mayawati.
He also emphasized that the needs of the people were met thanks to the collaboration of the state government and the BJP organization. He also credited PM Narendra Modi and other senior BJP leaders, including party president JP Nadda and home minister Amit Shah, with assisting the state government in meeting its objectives. "We were able to instil trust in people's governance and assist them on a variety of fronts." And this is the true identity of the current administration," he said.
He claimed that hunger-related deaths were common in UP. "However, after the BJP took power, it was discovered that nearly 40 lakh needy people did not have ration cards, which were otherwise used fraudulently by others." "We put a stop to it by equipping all 80,000 PDS stores with e-PoS machines," he said.
Yogi went on to say that the state government also made certain that people received adequate compensation during times of crisis. "In the last four and a half years, we transferred Rs 5 lakh crore to the needy through Direct Benefit Transfer (DBT)," he said.
On the job front, he stated that youth were hired on the basis of merit, while adhering to reservation provisions, rather than their "identity." In a veiled attack on the opposition, Yogi claimed that previously, the "whole Khandaan" would go out to "extort money" from job seekers. "Now, there is no 'dalaali,' and over 4.5 lakh jobs have been given to the youth," he said, insisting that in the previous government, even the transfer and posting of government officials had become a "industry."
"However, no one has been charged with corruption in the transfer of officials in the last 4.5 years. We've been able to maintain a stable government," he said.
Yogi stated that his government's image of "quick decision making" and an improvement in UP's ranking from 14th to 2nd in "ease of doing business" drew a slew of big investors to the state. He claimed that even small and medium-sized industries, which had been dying slowly under the previous government, were now exporting goods worth more than Rs 1.21 lakh crores.
The CM also took a shot at the previous SP and BSP governments, accusing them of paying only Rs 95,000 crore to cane growers between 2007 and 2017. "In contrast, our 4.5-year rule resulted in cane farmers receiving over Rs 1.43 lakh crore in compensation," he said. He also cited paddy and wheat procurement, which he claimed remained as low as 6 lakh MT per year under the previous administration.
Despite the Corona pandemic, this increased to 66 lakh MT of paddy and 56 lakh MT of wheat annually, according to Yogi. Yogi's remarks came in the midst of an ongoing farm protest that threatens to take on political overtones in the politically volatile west UP region.
