The government on Tuesday, 22 September, announced that Prime Minister Narendra Modi has visited 58 countries since 2015 and a total expenditure of Rs 517 crore was incurred on them.
Minister of State for External Affairs V Muraleedharan provided details on the prime minister's visits abroad since 2015, in a written reply in Rajya Sabha. He said that the prime minister had visited the United States, Russia and China the most – five visits each and multiple trips to other countries like Singapore, Germany, France, Sri Lanka and the United Arab Emirates, reported news agency PTI.
“The total expenditure on these visits was Rs 517.82 crore,” Muraleedharan said.
Prime Minister Modi’s last trip was to Brazil in November 2019, where he attended the BRICS (Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa) summit. While other visits that PM Modi took were multi-nation trips.
PM Modi made no visits in 2020 due to the COVID-19 pandemic.
Minister of State for External Affairs V Muraleedharan said that PM Modi’s visits to the countries have enhanced their understanding of India’s perspectives on bilateral, regional and global issues, PTI reported.
“These, in turn, have contributed to India's national development agenda to promote economic growth and well being of our people,” the minister said.
As per the data (shared by the then Minister of State for External Affairs VK Singh), Rs 1,583.18 crores was spent on maintenance of the PM’s aircraft and Rs 429.25 crores on chartered flights between 15 June 2014 and 3 December 2018. The total expenditure on the hotline was Rs 9.11 crore, reported NDTV.
(With inputs from PTI and NDTV)
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