Ready to pay the political price for steps taken for a better India: PM Modi

Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Thursday said he is ready to pay the political price for the steps taken by him for a better India and nothing would deter him from pursuing his mission.

Mr. Modi, who was delivering the inaugural address at the Hindustan Times Leadership Summit in New Delhi, said the government was committed to developing a development-centric eco-system, which was free of corruption and is citizen centric

Post demonetisation, black money, which was part of a parallel economy, has now become part of the formal system. Data mining after the note ban was also helping the government to track down those involved in corruption.

Lauds Aadhaar

The Prime Minister appreciated the role of Aadhaar in delivering services to people and also checking pilferages. “By linking Aadhaar to mobile and Jan Dhan, we have created such a system that could not have been imagined few years back. In the last three years, with the help of Aadhaar, crores of fake names have been



removed from the system. Now it is going to be a big weapon against benami properties,” he said.

The country saw a “behavioural change” after demonetisation, which helped in conversion of a “clean and healthy economy,” he noted.

“For the first time after Independence, the corrupt people are scared of transacting in black money. They are scared of being caught. The black money that was earlier the base of parallel economy has now become part of formal economy. Such an irreversible change is getting boost from Aadhaar. Aadhaar is such a power through which this government want to ensure rights of poor. It is also playing a big role in providing subsidised ration, scholarships, medicines, pensions and other government subsidies,” he said.

“Big transformations” do not come easily and to attain them, hauling up of the entire system was needed.“We can increase our ease of doing business ranking from 142 to 100 only when we take initiatives for big transformation,” he said.