This article could have had the scope of speculating whether the success of the NDA govt. schemes would lead to its victory in the much-awaited 2019 Lok Sabha Elections, if only this article was written earlier in time. Now, the air is clear, the parliamentary election in world’s largest democracy has ended and the people have given their verdict in favour of the Modi-led NDA, yet again. There will always be naysayers, but believe it or not, the Indian PM has one of the largest followings, ever. It’s not just his attitude, style, personality, or oratory skills that has garnered him so much love, fandom, believers, followers, and yay-sayers, its also the policies and schemes being brought around during his leadership and tenure at the prestigious office, that has reaped him so many praises. As we are stepping into whats being called as the second era of Narendra Modi Government, or simply “Modi 2.0”, lets have a brief look at the top 10 welfare schemes of the Government of the day.

1. Pradhan Mantri MUDRA Yojana (PMMY)

2. Swachh Bharat Mission (SBM)

Cleanliness is next to Godliness. The Prime Minister launched his pet project for a clean India on Mahatma Gandhi’s birth anniversary October 2, 2014. The PM roped in prominent personalities from the film industry, sports, media, business and other celebrities to promote the initiative. [2] there is also a swacchta sarvekshan been conducted time to time to adjudge the cleanest cities positions rank-wise; Indore in Madhya Pradesh has topped the list the third time as well.

PM Modi’s flagship sanitation campaign in India that aims to build toilets and clean up streets, roads and infrastructure of India’s cities, towns and rural areas. In urban areas, over 46 lakh individual toilets have been constructed out of nearly 94 lakh application received for toilet construction. Total community and public toilets stood at 3.1 lakh and the number of open defecation free (ODF) cities clocked at 2,212 as of May 24, 2018. In the rural areas, over 7.2 crore toilets have been constructed across all villages in India compared to 9.5 crore households that do not have toilets. More than 60 percent of the rural households in all sates are reported to have toilets except Odisha (55 percent) and Bihar (55.1 percent). Out of the 3.6 lakh villages which self-declared open defecation free (ODF), 2.5 lakh declarations have been verified. [3]

In October 2014, Bill Gates had praised Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s emphasis on building more toilets in the country. “Narendra Modi has India talking about toilets and that’s a great thing,” Gates said in a tweet which was retweeted by Modi. On his blog, Gates said, “This is not the kind of issue that most politicians like to talk about. But I would guess that in the short time he has been in office, Prime Minister Modi has done more to raise the awareness of the need for toilets than any other leader since the country gained independence“. [4]

3. Pradhan Mantri Kaushal Vikas Yojana (PMKVY)

Pradhan Mantri Kaushal Vikas Yojana (PMKVY) is the flagship scheme of the Ministry of Skill Development & Entrepreneurship (MSDE) implemented by National Skill Development Corporation. The objective of this Skill Certification Scheme is to enable a large number of Indian youth to take up industry-relevant skill training that will help them in securing a better livelihood. Individuals with prior learning experience or skills will also be assessed and certified under Recognition of Prior Learning (RPL).

4.Beti Bachao – Beti Padhao

“When you educate a man, you educate a man but when you educate a woman, you educate a generation”.  With an objective to generate awareness and to improve the welfare services provided to women, on January 25, 2015, Modi launched the Beti Bachao, Beti Padhao campaign. The focus was laid on 100 selected districts that are low in Child Sex Ratio (CSR) for safeguarding the survival and education of a girl child.  Beti Bachao, Beti Padhao (BBBP) was launched by the Hon’ble Prime Minister, Shri Narendra Modi, on 22^nd January, 2015 in Panipat, Haryana as one of the flagship programmes of the Government, to address the declining Child Sex Ratio and related issues of empowerment of women on a life-cycle continuum. It is a tri-ministerial, convergent effort of Ministries of Women and Child Development, Health & Family Welfare and Human Resource Development with a focus on awareness and advocacy campaign for changing mindsets, multi-sectoral action in select 161 districts (low on CSR), enabling girls’ education and effective enforcement of Pre-Conception & Pre Natal Diagnostic Techniques (PC&PNDT) Act. The Scheme has been received well and has been successful in establishing the improvement in Child Sex Ratio as a National Agenda. It has resulted in increased awareness, sensitization and conscious building around the issue of declining CSR in the public domain. [7]

5.Pradhan Mantri Jan-Dhan Yojana (PMJDY)

The Prime Minister’s Jan Dhan Yojana (PMJDY) is a financial inclusion programme that makes services like banking, remittance and insurance available to every Indian at affordable cost. Beneficiaries can open a zero-balance account. As of August 16, 2017, 295 million new bank accounts had been opened under the PMJDY. More than 176 million of these accounts are in rural India, and around 145 million are operated by women. [8]

PM Modi’s flagship financial inclusion scheme, Pradhan Mantri Jan-Dhan Yojana, aims to ensure access to financial services such as banking, savings and deposit accounts, remittance, credit, insurance, pension in an affordable manner. Launched in august 2014, the objective of this scheme was to connect more and more number of people to banking services. Under this scheme, 31.60 crore people across India opened a Jan-Dhan account as of May 9, 2018. By far, the PMJDY has emerged as one of the world’s largest financial inclusion programmes. Special benefits under PMJDY Scheme include accidental insurance cover of Rs 1 lakh, no minimum balance requirement and a life cover of Rs 30,000 payable on death of the beneficiary. The PMJDY has emerged as one of the world’s largest financial inclusion programmes. [9]

6.Prime Minister Ujjwala Plan/ Pradhan Mantri Ujjwala Yojana (PMUY)

Launched on May 1, 2016, its aim was to provide the LPG connection to BPL families at subsidized rates. Under the PM Ujjwala Yojana, the government aims to provide LPG connections to below poverty line (BPL) households in the country to replace unclean cooking fuels used in rural India with the clean and more efficient LPG (Liquefied Petroleum Gas). Earlier this year, the Centre had revised its target to provide LPG connections to eight crore from five crore. Nearly four crore (3,98,77,723) connections have been given under the scheme so far, about 80 lakh of them in the past five months. [10]

7. Deen Dayal Upadhyaya Gram Jyoti Yojana (DDUGJY)

The idea of electrifying every village in India was conveyed by PM Modi in his August 15 speech in 2015 where he promised electrification all un-electrified villages within 1,000 days. As per government records, by April 1, 2015, India had about 18,452 unelectrified villages. The task to electrify the remaining villages was completed in 988 days as on April 28, 2018 as electricity reached Manipur’s Leisang village after over 70 years of Independence under the Deen Dayal Upadhyaya Gram Jyoti Yojana (DDUGJY). The Prime Minister, however, launched a Rs 16,320-crore Pradhan Mantri Sahaj Bijli Har Ghar Yojana, or Saubhagya scheme to provide electricity connections to over 40 million families in rural and urban areas by December 2018. Out of the set target to provide electricity connection to 3,80,23,012 households, the government has so provided electricity connection to 61,89,812 houses as on May 25, 2018. [11]

Aimed at providing round the clock power to rural households and adequate power to agricultural consumers, the DDUGJY involved feeder separation, strengthening of sub-transmission and the distribution network, metering at all levels, village electrification, and setting up micro-grid and off-grid distribution networks. [12]

8. Ayushman Bharat

The Ayushman Bharat Yojana is also known as Pradhan Mantri Jan Arogya Yojana (PMJAY) or National Health Protection Scheme or Modicare. Ayushman Bharat aims to provide healthcare facilities to over 10 crore families covering urban and rural poor. PMJAY-Ayushman Bharat is the biggest government-sponsored healthcare scheme in the world. The scheme offers an insurance cover of Rs 5 lakh, which will cover almost 50 crore citizens. [13]

Its no longer the case that there is an absence of healthcare facilities for the poor in the country. As Modi always states “Govt. schemes and policies are for the poor of the country.” The sole motto of this scheme is to covering both preventive and pro-motive health, to address healthcare holistically. [14]

Ayushman Bharat is Narendra Modi government’s flagship healthcare scheme that aims to provide medical coverage to over 10 crore poor families. The Narendra Modi government has received appreciation from the billionaire philanthropist Bill Gates on the first 100 days of the Ayushman Bharat Scheme. Gates also congratulated the government for providing healthcare benefits to 6.85 lakh people in such a short span of time. In his tweet, Gates wrote, “Congratulations to the Indian government on the first 100 days of @AyushmanNHA. It’s great to see how many people have been reached by the program so far. @PMOIndia” [15]

9. Pradhan Mantri Kisan Samman Nidhi

10. Khelo India

Aim was to promote sports in youth. Thus the proposal of Khelo India was something of a fresh breath in the stale air that had settled around Olympic sports in India. To the apparent eye, the success of the Khelo India School Games has been immense with a viewership of over 100 million and participation of over 3000 young athletes.

Until the inaugural KISG took place in January, there was almost no specific scouting of talented athletes in India but for the SAI National Sports Talent Contest. The appointment of a sports icon and India’s first ever Individual Silver medallist brought with it a promise of setting things rolling in the right direction.

The objective of the KISG was to help India’s youth develop into a contender in international sporting events by helping them with funds, coaching, top-notch infrastructure, raising awareness regarding the importance of physical fitness, encouraging the development of women’s sport and so on. The Games were spread over 16 disciplines which are Archery, Athletics, Badminton, Basketball, Boxing, Football, Gymnastics, Hockey, Judo, Kabaddi, Kho-Kho, Shooting, Swimming, Volleyball, Weightlifting, and Wrestling.

The sports budget received a considerably large hike in the 2018 budget, a total of Rs 1943 crore. The initial money that was alloted for Khelo India was Rs. 140 crores. But after the latest developments, the budget has been increased to Rs 350 crores. These have been some shortcomings of the Khelo India School Games that are a shade difficult to ignore. However, there is no denying that this was still a step forward, irrespective of big or small. [17]

Sources:

[1]https://www.indiatoday.in/education-today/gk-current-affairs/story/modi-government-979349-2017-05-26

[2]https://www.indiatoday.in/education-today/gk-current-affairs/story/modi-government-979349-2017-05-26

[3]https://www.moneycontrol.com/news/india/four-years-of-modi-government-heres-how-key-welfare-scheme-have-performed-2576277.html

[4]https://www.businesstoday.in/current/economy-politics/bill-gates-ayushman-bharat-scheme-congratulates-narendra-modi-govt/story/310910.html

[5]https://www.indiatoday.in/education-today/gk-current-affairs/story/modi-government-979349-2017-05-26

[6] http://www.makeinindia.com/eight-key-developments-in-india

[7] http://pib.nic.in/newsite/PrintRelease.aspx?relid=177109

[8] http://www.makeinindia.com/eight-key-developments-in-india

[9]https://www.livemint.com/Politics/3z36JaNMpmhX68Kjc0BgfP/How-does-the-Narendra-Modi-govt-score-on-welfare-schemes.html

[10]https://www.moneycontrol.com/news/india/four-years-of-modi-government-heres-how-key-welfare-scheme-have-performed-2576277.html

[11] ibid.

[12]https://www.livemint.com/Politics/1lxa2DmgHmGyeW8wX8BqjP/Narendra-Modi-highlights-success-of-rural-electrification.html

[13]https://economictimes.indiatimes.com/articleshow/65920546.cms?from=mdr&utm_source=contentofinterest&utm_medium=text&utm_campaign=cppst.html

[14] https://www.pmjay.gov.in/

[15]https://www.businesstoday.in/current/economy-politics/bill-gates-ayushman-bharat-scheme-congratulates-narendra-modi-govt/story/310910.html

[16] https://www.dailyexcelsior.com/how-successful-is-digital-india/

[17] https://thebridge.in/hit-or-miss-re-evaluating-the-success-of-khelo-india-school-games/