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Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Monday accused the previous United Progressive Alliance government at the Centre of not fulfilling its duties and instead blaming the states for it.
Addressing a public meeting at Silvasa in Dadra and Nagar Haveli, he said while it is the duty of the Centre to give out land rights to the tribals, the previous Congress government always blamed states for it.
"Gujarat and Madhya Pradesh saw best progress in land rights to tribals. But the government of India and Congress leaders used to instigate the tribals that the Modi government (when he was the chief minister of Gujarat) was not giving land rights to tribals," he told the gathering.
He said that when he became the prime minister, he realised that it is the duty of the Centre and not the states to hand over land rights to the tribals.
"They were in power for 10 years, but they had always put the states on the docks (for not giving land rights)... not even a single tribal in the UnionTerritory was given land rights," he said.
Before the meeting, he handed over land rights to tribals, gas connections to women and aids to physically challenged people.
Continuing his broadside, the prime minister said the Congress contested the 2014 Lok Sabha elections on the plank of increasing subsidised gas cylinders from nine to 12.
"But after we came to power, we have provided gas connections to two crore households," he said, adding that it has helped improve the health of women who used to cook using wood as fuel.
Referring to his government's push for generic medicine, Modi said the poor should also get medicines and asserted that cheap medicine does not mean it lacks quality.
He warned against propaganda that generic medicines lack quality.
Photograph: PTI Photo