New Delhi: Prime Minister Narendra Modi will turn 76 on Thursday, September 17. The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) plans to turn the day into a major show
of strength, and has invited its National Democratic Alliance (NDA) partners for a ‘Seva Sankalp Abhiyan’ marking 25 years of the PM in public life.
Here are a list of events planned by the BJP to mark the PM’s 76th birthday
Seva Sankalp Abhiyan: The Seva Sankalp Abhiyan is a month-long nationwide campaign running until October 17 to honour PM Modi’s 25 years in continuous constitutional public office. The BJP plans to turn the event into a show of strength and has invited leaders of its top coalition partners for the event. Those expected to attend the event are Union Ministers, Rajnath Singh and Amit Shah, N Chandrababu Naidu of the TDP, Eknath Shinde of the Shiv Sena (Shinde), Anupriya Patel of Apna Dal and Chirag Paswan of the LJP.
All of these leaders will attend the flag-off ceremonies of various events which are being held across the country to mark the PM’s birthday.
1. Bike rallies: One of the major events planned for the day are bike rallies from his birthplace Vadnagar in Gujarat to Varanasi in Uttar Pradesh, his parliamentary constituency. Another rally would start from Varanasi and end in Vadnagar.
The event in Varanasi is expected to be flagged off by Union Minister, Rajnath Singh, UP CM Yogi Adityanath, TDP Chief Chandrababu Naidu, Union Minister Chirag Paswan and UP Deputy CMs, Keshav Prasad Maurya and Brajesh Pathak. In Vadnagar, Union Home Minister Amit Shah, Anupriya Patel, Maharashtra Deputy Chief Minister Eknath Shinde, Gujarat Chief Minister Bhupendra Patel and several other top leaders would be present in Vadnagar, Gujarat to flag off the bike rally from there.
During this bike rally, water from rivers across the country will be collected for a ‘jalabhishek’ at the Hatkeshwar Temple in Vadnagar and the Kashi Vishwanath Temple in Varanasi.
2. Aashirwad ka Diya and Ujjain Deepotsav: Apart from bike rallies, the BJP is also organising an ‘Aashirwad Ka Diya’ campaign. In this, families and government scheme beneficiaries all over India have been requested to light a diya at home between 6 to 7 pm on September 17 and pray for the PM’s health and longevity.
In Ujjain meanwhile, a mega celebration is planned at the Ramghat along the Kshipra River. Here, 2.5 lakh diyas will be lit to form a grand ‘Vikas ka Deepak’ or “Lamp of progress”.
3. Yatri Sewa Abhiyan: All government-run airports across the country, like th Netaji Subhash Chandra Bose Airport in Kolkata are starting a 24-day passenger service campaign to mark the PM’s birthday. The event which will go up to October 10, will see cultural performances, enhanced passenger assistance desks, and customer engagement events.
4. Sewa Diwas: The BJP is also marking the PM’s birthday as ‘Sewa Diwas’. There would be large-scale blood donation drives, organised locally, across the country. These will be led by the BJP youth wing. There would also be free eye and health check-up camps organised during the day.
There would be distribution drives across the country, where electric scooters and artificial limbs would be handed over to the specially-abled persons. Apart from this specialised food resource rollouts, like Kolkata’s Annapurna Scheme.
Apart from this a massive public cleanliness drive will be organised under the Swachh Bhrat Abhiyan. This will also see tree plantation drives and water conservation awareness campaigns across several states in the country.
5. Digital and youth outreach: The BJP’s IT wing plans to collect and upload over 1 million ‘Happy Birthday’ selfie videos dedicated to PM Narendra Modi to mark the special day. Apart from this, schools and colleges across the country will host drawing, essay writing and speech contests. These would highlight India’s development and governance reforms in the past 25 years.
