Less than 24 hours since his return from the US, Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi paid a surprise visit to the construction site of the new Parliament building.
This visit was to a first-hand look and inspection of the construction status at the Central Vista Project site.
PM Modi addressed the 76th session of the United Nations General Assembly and attended the first in-person Quad summit meeting.
PM Modi addressed the UNGA session and cautioned about countries with “regressive thinking” that are using terrorism as a “political tool”.
He also held bilateral and multilateral engagements, including with US President Joe Biden, US vice president Kamala Harris and his Australian and Japanese counterparts—Scott Morrison and Yoshihide Suga—respectively.
After his discussions at the QUAD meeting with leaders of the United States, Japan and Australia, PM Modi tweeted:
“The discussions with @POTUS@JoeBiden, PM @ScottMorrisonMP and PM @sugawitter were extensive and productive.”
The US visit marked the first visit of the Indian Prime Minister since the outbreak of the Covid-19 pandemic.
On his return, Minister of Law and Justice, Kiren Rijiju, tweeted:
“The sudden visit of Prime Minister @narendramodi ji at the Central Vista site just after returning from his US visit will motivate the engineers and the whole team who are working day and night.”
The Centra Vista Avenue redevelopment project was announced by the Centre government on September 13, 2019.
It aims at redeveloping 86 acres of land in Delhi with a new triangular Parliament building, a common Central secretariat, revamping of the 3-km Rajpath from Rashtrapati Bhavan to India Gate, new Prime Minister’s residence and office, and a new Vice President Enclave.
The estimated cost of the Central Vista Project has been revised to Rs.20,000 crore.
PM Modi had laid the foundation stone for the project on December 10, 2020.
PM Modi arrived at the Central Vista Project site at 8.45 pm without much security details.
He spent almost an hour at the under construction parliament building.
In the photos from the site, PM Modi could be seen wearing a safety helmet and interacting with the engineers.
Before visiting the site, PM Modi attended more than twenty official meetings with USA government and Fortune 500 CEOs.
Foreign secretary Harsh Vardhan Shringla had earlier described that PM Modi’s visit to the US has been “very successful.”
