On 7 November 2014, in the first phase of Sansad Adarsh Gram Yojana, PM Modi had adopted Jayapur village, about 30 km away from his Lok Sabha constituency of Varanasi. The scheme aims at uniting politicians across the board to adopt one village for one year and turn it into a ‘model’ village for infrastructural and social development.
While Jayapura village received unprecedented help and saw remarkable development during the one year that it was ‘Modi’s Village’, the golden year seems to have passed. In this ground report, The Quint found that toilets and roads lie in a state of disrepair, women defecate in the open, solar power is no longer free. Locals say development began and ended with Modi.
So has Modi’s flagship scheme lost steam?
A report in India Today suggests:
About 2,200 villages have to be developed in the first three phases of SAGY by 2019. The deadline for every MP to nominate a village for phase II has already lapsed on January 31. According to official data, only 23 out of 543 Lok Sabha members have come forward and identified villages to carry out development projects. The situation is no better with Rajya Sabha MPs, as only 6 out of 252 MPs have shown interest in the initiative.
(With inputs from Roshan Jaiswal in Varanasi)
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