Home India UPA didn’t let me rebuild Kedarnath, Lord chose me: PM Modi

UPA didn’t let me rebuild Kedarnath, Lord chose me: PM Modi

"I couldn’t stop myself and I requested the then (Congress) government in Uttarakhand to give Gujarat the responsibility of rebuilding Kedarnath. The then (Uttarakhand) Chief Minister had agreed,” PM Modi said.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Friday said the previous UPA government at the Centre had disallowed the Gujarat government, then led by him, to rebuild Kedarnath after flash floods devastated the area in 2013, but Lord Shiva had perhaps wished otherwise.

After laying the foundation stone for five infrastructure projects, Modi recounted that when he heard about the devastation at Kedarnath in 2013, he could not stop himself and offered the Uttarakhand government help to rebuild the area.

“In 2013 I was the chief minister of a state (Gujarat). Though I had no right to encroach upon another state, I couldn’t stop myself and I requested the then (Congress) government in Uttarakhand to give Gujarat the responsibility of rebuilding Kedarnath. The then (Uttarakhand) Chief Minister had agreed,” he said, referring to Vijay Bahuguna, who is now with the BJP.

“My request for rebuilding Kedarnath created a storm in Delhi and the Uttarakhand Chief Minister had to decline the help we had offered,” Modi said. “Lekin shayad Baba ne hi tay kiya tha ki ye kaam Baba ke bete ke haath se hi hoga,” he said, and the crowd of 4,000 cheered him.

That the BJP was voted to power in Uttarakhand was another sign that he was “chosen” for the reconstruction work at Kedarnath, Modi said.

The Prime Minister said that the visit, which was his second in recent months, had given him “fresh energy”.

His forehead covered with yellow chandan and a red teeka, a rudraksh garland around his neck, Modi said all the people of the country would attain the energy to take India to the pinnacle of development by 2022, the 75th year after Independence. He spoke of attaining “new energy (nayi urja)”, new resolve and a “fully pure mind (poorna pavitra mann)” during his visit to Kedarnath.

After wishing communities, including Gujaratis, who celebrated the start of a new year on Friday, he said that with the new year would see the fresh construction of Kedarpuri, the township which encompasses Kedarnath.

Of the five infrastructure projects that he started, one would be for widening the road leading to Kedarnath, construction of a ghat and a retaining wall on rivers Mandakini and Saraswati, construction of houses for the purohit (priest) community, and the construction of a grand ‘samadhi sthal’ of Adi Sankara.

“I invite the governments across the country and the corporate world too to use their CSR (corporate social responsibility) funds to rebuild Kedarnath,” he said.

The detailed reports for the five projects are yet to be prepared. Uttarakhand Tourism Secretary R Meenakshi Sundaram said they would roughly cost up to Rs 250 crore.

Modi had visited the shrine on May 3 when the portals of the shrine were opened for summer.

“When I had come here during opening of the shrine portals, I had made some promises to myself,” Modi said. “And I have returned before the closing of the portals. Today, the foundation stone was laid for a grand reconstruction of the Kedarnath shrine premises,” he said, adding that the newly constructed Kedarnath township would serve as a model for all pilgrimage centres across the country. An approach road would be constructed to the temple to create a “divya vatavaran (divine environment)”, the lighting of the road leading to the temple would be done accordingly, he said.

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