In his last Mann Ki Baat of 2019, Prime Minister Narendra Modi stressed the power of youth in transforming India. Modi said the youth cannot tolerate wrongdoings, and with the spread of social media, proofs of wrongdoings often go viral.

He urged people to take up development programmes and mentioned West Champaran as an example.

“A school alumni group organised a free health check-up for the villagers there. Such initiatives can be taken up to strengthen infrastructure of villages by alumni groups,” Modi said.

Next he mentioned a women self-help group of Phulpur in Uttar Pradesh, which took to footwear manufacturing under the Grameen Aajeevika Mission. “Their business flourished so well that now there is a manufacturing plant with modern machinery,” he said.

He urged the listeners to buy local products until the 75th Independence Day in 2022.

Modi talked of ‘Himayat,’ a skill development programme in Jammu and Kashmir. He said 18,000 youths were trained in 77 trades and 5,000 were employed under the programme.

He mentioned a Kargil resident Parveen Fatima, who is a supervisor and coordinator in a garment unit in Tirupur. Another youth Faiyaz Ahmad, who passed the 12th grade in 2012 but could not go to college because of a heart disorder, did a course in Information Technology Enabled Services and is now employed in Punjab. Raqeeb, a young man from Anant Nag, did a course in retail and now works as a team leader in a corporate house, Modi said.

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