Guwahati:

Union Minister Jyotiraditya M Scindia said on Saturday that 100 per cent coverage of villages in terms of telecom connectivity in the country is targeted in the next 12 months.

Jyotiraditya Scindia, the Union minister for Communications and Development of North Eastern Region (DoNER), said special funds have been sanctioned by the Cabinet for the purpose and he has himself been monitoring the progress of work every week.

Addressing a press conference, he said, “The Prime Minister is committed to 100 per cent saturation. We have identified around 24,000 villages in the country that still need saturation in terms of telecom connection.” A special scheme to reach all these villages has already been rolled out along with funds sanctioned for the purpose, he said.

Areas in the northeastern states are among these villages, and strategies are being worked out to reach these places, the minister said.

Provisions of the new telecom Act enable setting up required infrastructure and mixed technologies, like V-sat and satellite, are being utilised with the “target of cent per cent saturation within 12 months”, Jyotiraditya Scindia said.

“I have been monitoring the work on a weekly basis, and 13,000-14,000 of these villages have also been covered,” he added.

Jyotiraditya Scindia also spoke about the allocations for northeastern states in the 2024-25 Union Budget.

“For the past 75 years, North East was treated as an orphan. But Prime Minister Narendra Modi is determined to make the region the engine of growth,” he claimed.

Special funds of about Rs 11,000 crore have been earmarked for flood management in Assam and Sikkim, and 100 new branches of India Post Payments Bank will come up in the region as per provisions of the budget.

Jyotiraditya Scindia maintained that the region will benefit from the different schemes for women, farmers, youth and economically weaker sections as provided in the budget.

He asserted that the importance given to the region can be gauged from increased monetary allocation to the DoNER ministry, more funds coming through the devolution of central taxes and investment in developing connectivity infrastructure.

The minister maintained that major industrial projects would soon enter the region with the proper infrastructure in place.

Jyotiraditya Scindia cited the example of the Rs 27,000-crore semi-conductor unit to be set up by the Tata Group near Guwahati and termed it as a ‘game changer’ for the entire North East.

“It is a holistic budget, which will set in a new era for the entire country,” the Union minister added.

(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)

Shivpuri:

Union minister and the BJP’s Guna candidate Jyotiraditya Scindia on Wednesday said Congress has become “behosh” (unconscious) because of the “josh” (passion) of BJP workers.

He was speaking at a gathering of BJP workers at Khaniyadhana in Shivpuri district which comes under the Guna constituency.

“Because of the BJP workers’ ‘josh and hosh’ (passion and alertness), Congress has become ‘behosh’. We should not sit idle till we achieve the target given by Prime Minister Narendra Modi of winning more than 400 Lok Sabha seats,” he said.

He urged party workers to connect with 370 new voters in each booth for ensuring a historic victory for the Bharatiya Janata Party.

His grandmother, late BJP stalwart Vijayaraje Scindia used to carry a ‘gamcha’ (cotton scarf) to deal with the heat, and he too keeps an onion in his pocket while campaigning, the Union minister said. It is traditionally believed that the onion keeps heat stroke away.

BJP workers should work so hard that Congress would not get consciousness at all, Mr Scindia further said.

Congress has fielded Rao Yadvendra Singh Yadav against Mr Scindia in Guna seat which has a sizable number of Yadav voters.

In 2019, Mr Scindia as Congress candidate lost to the BJP’s Krishna Pal Singh Yadav by more than 1.25 lakh votes. Mr Scindia joined the BJP in 2020.

(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)