TIRUPATI: Union home minister
Amit Shah, in his opening remarks at the 29th meeting of the Southern Zonal Council in Tirupati on Sunday, said that India’s development cannot be imagined without the very important contribution of the states of Southern India.
The ancient culture, traditions and languages of the states of southern India enrich India’s culture and ancient legacy.
The union home minister underlined that the Modi government respects all of India’s regional languages and therefore at today’s southern zonal council meeting, facilities for translation into all languages of the states that are in the Southern zonal council have been made. The Home minister desired that he would be happy to see delegates feeling free to speak in the language of their state in the future. "We have been able to achieve 111 crore vaccine doses as of today during the Covid -19 pandemic. This is a big achievement and an example of cooperative Federalism. It is Prime minister Narendra Modi’s vision to leverage cooperative and competitive federalism to achieve all round
growth in the country", Amit Shah asserted.
The union home minister recalled that When the pandemic began, it was said that India would not be able to cope with it. However, India quickly ramped up its health infrastructure as well as domestic production of vaccines under leadership of Prime minister Narendra Modi. Today, we have overcome fear about the pandemic and the union govt will continue to do everything possible to cover all states under the vaccination programme. Amit Shah claimed that the zonal councils are advisory bodies in nature and yet we have been able to successfully solve many issues. The zonal councils provide an opportunity for interaction at the highest level amongst members.
The Home minister stated that in the last 7 years we have held 18 meetings of Zonal councils, compared to which very few meetings were held earlier. Now meetings of different zonal councils are convened regularly and this could happen only with the cooperation of all state govts as well as central ministries and departments.
Home minister Amit Shah who listened to the concerns, interstate issues and other key aspects concerning interstate cooperation as well as cooperation from the centre represented by Chief ministers of AP YS Jaganmohan Reddy, Karnataka Chief minister Basavaraj Bommai, Puducherry CM N Rangaswamy, Telangana, Kerala and Tamil Nadu representatives, promised them that the union government under the leadership of Prime minister Narendra Modi will address all the issues concerning the five southern states and three union territories at the earliest possible time frame.