the G2At India’s Prime Minister Narendra Modi delivered a virtual speech at the G20 Anti-Corruption Ministerial Meeting in Kolkata on Saturday, August 12 from New Delhi.
According to Prime Minister Narendra Modi, “India has a strict policy of zero tolerance against corruption,” and he went on to say that the country is using e-governance and technology to make its system of government more open and accountable.
M. Modi continued by using Tagore’s works to make the point that greed blinds us to reality. In addition, he discussed the ‘Ma Gridha,’ or ‘let there be no greed,’ that is the goal of the ancient Indian Upanishads.
Prime Minister Modi said that the poor and the marginalised are the ones who suffer the most as a result of corruption.
“It affects resource utilisation, distorts markets, impacts service delivery, and ultimately diminishes people’s quality of life,” he said.
Modi claimed that it is the government’s responsibility to increase the State’s resources in order to maximise the welfare of its people, citing Kautilya’s Arthashastra.
“The need to combat corruption to achieve this goal and said that it is the sacred duty of the government towards its people,” he said.
The flaws and leaks in government programmes and welfare initiatives, he said, are being closed.
Direct benefit payments into bank accounts have benefited hundreds of millions of Indians and helped them save over $36 billion, he said.
“Our government e-Marketplace, or GeM portal, has brought greater transparency in government procurement,” he said.
In light of the passage of the Economic criminals Act in 2018, Prime Minister Modi boasted that the government was actively seeking for and apprehending economic criminals, and that assets totaling over $1.8 billion had been recovered from economic offenders and fugitives.
The PMLA, which he mentioned, has been used to seize about USD 12 billion in criminals’ assets since 2014, he said.
Prime Minister Modi.
