Union Minister Dr Jitendra Singh on Sunday said that Prime Minister Narendra Modi gave J&K the real “self-rule”.

Speaking at Palli Panchayat during the National Panchayat Day programme ahead of the PM’s address, Dr Jitendra Singh said that Jammu & Kashmir was often known for slogans of Self-Rule by certain political parties. However, he said, if the essence and meaning of self-rule are that it is the democracy born from the grassroots, then it is only Modi who introduced us to the concept of self-rule by first holding successful Panchayat elections and then conducting the first-ever District Development Council elections after over 70 years of independence.

The process of empowerment of Panchayats under Modi is continuously going on and today is an important landmark in the same sequence wherein the Prime Minister has chosen to address Panchayati Raj Institutions (PRIs) across the country from a Jammu Panchayat. This, he said, is a reiteration of Modi’s commitment to not only strengthen but also empower Panchayati Raj in J&K in the same manner as in the rest of the country.

Dr Jitendra Singh said, the news of Prime Minister Modi’s visit to Palli Panchayat inspired so much enthusiasm that officials and experts from the Union Ministry of Science & Technology set up a 500 Kilowatt Solar Plant in a record 18 days, which will provide solar electricity to 348 village households.

Crediting Modi for giving the highest priority to Jammu & Kashmir, Dr Jitendra Singh recalled that soon after Modi took over as Prime Minister on 26 May 2014, one of the first important programmes attended by him was the inauguration of the Katra-Vaishnodevi Railway station, which later, on his suggestion, became the country’s first Railway Station to run totally on solar power.

Within three months of Modi’s taking over as Prime Minister, there was a devastating flood in Jammu & Kashmir in September 2014 and the entire city of Srinagar was underwater. Prime Minister Modi, he said, not only provided every support from the Centre and made repeated visits to personally monitor the situation, but set the highest precedence of sensitivity by taking a decision in October 2014 that as Prime Minister, he would not observe his first Diwali anywhere else but he would do so among the flood victims of Kashmir Valley. The following year in November 2015, he said, while speaking at a Srinagar Public Rally he announced the highest-ever financial package of Rs.80000 Crore for Jammu & Kashmir.

The most remarkable feature of the last eight years of Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s rule is that he not only gave Jammu & Kashmir several important national level projects but through personal intervention also revived many such projects which had, for certain reasons, been halted or delayed. One of them is the Rattle Power Project which he launched today. Similarly, he recalled that during his last visit to Jammu, he had launched the Shahpur-Kandi project which had been stalled for about 40 years.