Abuja: External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar drew an analogy while describing the country’s growth in digital public infrastructure and said that the number of cashless transactions the United States does in three years, India does in a month.
The EAM was interacting with the people of the Indian community in Nigeria on Sunday (local time).
“The life of every Indian citizen has become easier and this is because we have embraced technology in a very deep way. You can see this in payment, very few people today pay in cash and very few people accept cash…Today, we do as many cashless payments in India in a month as much as America does in three years,” Jaishankar said at the event.
He further highlighted the five major examples that showcase the transformation of India in the last decade.
“For me, how a country deals with a challenge, recovers from the challenge, and is able to pose such a strong economic performance, how the life of an average citizen becomes better, how we are capable of something that captures the imagination of the world and how do we look after our people outside the country. These are five true examples of what changed in India in the last decade,” Jaishankar said.
The EAM also lauded the way India dealt with Covid pandemic while pointing that many countries have still not been able to cope with the impact and highlighting that New Delhi brought back 7 million of its people from abroad.
“I take great heart, great hope and great faith from how India dealt with it. When Covid started, during a virtual meeting in 2020, it was said that the country that will be most unable to cope with Covid would be India. Two years later, I saw that we went through the Covid wave, and lockdowns…we started making medicines for the rest of the world,” he further said.
Stressing that India is the fastest-growing economy in the world, Jaishankar said that business sentiment about New Delhi has improved and as a result, the flow of investments into the country has reached its highest ever.
“Today, what is happening in the economy…we are the fastest-growing big economy in the world…but it is much more than that. Today, if you see the economic activity in India, wherever you go, something is being built. A metro is being built, a road is being built, new airports are coming up, new trains are coming up, railway stations are coming up. If you go to your village, piped water is coming up, there is electricity connection coming,” Jaishankar said.
He added, “There is a sense today that India is being built at a fantastic pace, not just being built, that growth rate actually covers many other things. You can see the flow of investment in India, the highest ever. Look at the business sentiment about India. For me, the real change is the change I see in our own people”.
Notably, Jaishankar is on a visit to Nigeria from January 21-23. During this, he will co-chair the 6th India-Nigeria Joint Commission Meeting (JCM) with his counterpart and meet with other leaders.
Prior to this, he also led the Indian delegation at the 19th Summit of the Non-Aligned Movement (NAM), to be held in Kampala, Uganda.
He also met several foreign leaders and UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres on the sidelines of the summit.
The EAM will also inaugurate the 3rd edition of the Nigeria-India Business Council meeting, deliver a speech at the Nigerian Institute of International Affairs, interact with CII Business delegates and inaugurate the bust of Mahatma Gandhi.
He will also chair the regional conference of Indian Heads of Missions. India and Nigeria have traditionally enjoyed close and friendly relations. This is EAM’s first visit to Nigeria, which will further consolidate bilateral relations between the two countries, the release said.
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