New Delhi, Aug 15: Addressing the nation of over 1.2 billion for the eighth year, India’s PM Manmohan Singh greeted citizens on 65th year of independence. In his address he highlighted achievements and counted challenges faced by the nation and what government intends to do to face those challenges.
Here is the highlight of his speech:

PM said, “We cannot do much about the conditions (global economy) that prevail outside our country.” However on positive note he said, “we must make every effort to resolve the problems inside our country so that our economic growth and the creation of employment opportunities in the country are again speeded up.”

With India’s GDP reaching the classical Hindu growth rate in first quarter of FY13, PM on cautionary note said that if we do not increase the pace of the country’s economic growth, take steps to encourage new investment in the economy, improve the management of Government finances and work for the livelihood security of the common man and energy security of the country, then it most certainly affects our national security.

“we have achieved extraordinary successes in many areas in the last 8 years. We now need to replicate these successes in newer areas,” Manmohan Singh said further.

Today, one out of every 5 households in the country has become eligible to benefit from the Mahatma Gandhi Rural Employment Act through a job card. In only the last one year we have provided employment to more than 8 crore people under this scheme.

Under the Rajiv Gandhi Rural Electrification Scheme, more than 1 lakh new villages have been provided with electricity connections under this scheme and now almost all the villages in the country have been electrified. “Our next target is to provide electricity to each and every household in our country in the next 5 years and to also improve the supply of electricity,” said PM.

More than 51,000 new schools have been opened in the country and about 7 lakh teachers appointed in them in just the last 2 years. Now we will focus on improving the quality of education.

The National Skill Development Council has formulated a major scheme for skill development in which 8 crore people will be trained in the next 5 years. This is an ambitious scheme which can be implemented only through a specialized agency of the Central Government.

Recently we have taken new measures to accelerate infrastructure development. Ambitious targets have been fixed in roads, airports, railways, electricity generation and coal production.

Just 10 years back only 3 out of every 10 households in our villages were benefitting from banking services. Today more than half of the rural households get the benefit of bank accounts. It will be our endeavour to ensure that all households benefit from bank accounts in the next 2 years.

We will soon launch the Rajiv Housing Loan Scheme. Under this scheme, people belonging to the economically weaker sections would be given relief on interest for housing loans of less than Rs. 5 lakh.

On Assam violence PM said we are doing everything possible to provide relief to them. I also promise to you that our Government will make every effort to understand the reasons behind the Assam violence and work hard with the State Governments to ensure that such incidents are not repeated in any part of the country.

PM congratulated scientists and technologists for successfully testing the Agni V Missile and launching the RISAT- I Satellite in space this year. Recently the Cabinet has approved the Mars Orbiter Mission.

The Lok Sabha has cleared the Lokpal and Lokayukta Bill. We hope that all political parties will help us in passing this Bill in the Rajya Sabha.