Modi says India spends ₹6 lakh crore annually on foreign shipping—nearly equal to defence budget.
Share of India’s trade on domestically built ships fell from 40 per cent (50 yrs ago) to 5 per cent today.
Govt recognises big ships as infrastructure to strengthen maritime industry.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi called for a "atmanirbharta" on Saturday, claiming that India's reliance on foreign countries was its biggest enemy and that the nation should produce everything from ships to semiconductor chips.
Speaking at the 'Samudra se Samruddhi' event in Gandhi Maidan in Bhavnagar, Gujarat, he laid the foundation stones and officially opened projects totalling Rs 34,200 crore.
"In the true sense, India does not have any big enemy in the world. The only enemy of India is the dependence on other countries. We need to defeat this dependence on others. We have to understand that the more we are dependent on others, the rate of failure is high," he asserted.
"From chips to ships, we must make everything. For peace, stability and wealth, the country with the highest population in the world has to become self-reliant," the PM emphasised.
He asserted that atmanirbharta, or self-reliance, is the only remedy for all of India's issues.
Modi emphasised the financial cost of this reliance by stating that the nation pays a foreign company Rs 6 lakh crore a year to ship its goods all over the world.
"This is almost equal to our defence budget," he told the massive crowd.
According to the PM, ships built in India accounted for 40 per cent of the nation's trade about 50 years ago, but today that percentage is only 5 per cent.
The prime minister claimed that by acknowledging big ships as infrastructure, his administration had made a historic step to support India's marine industry.
"India's ports are the backbone of our nation's rise as a global maritime powerhouse," he asserted.
Attacking previous dispensations under the Congress, the PM said the party suppressed the inherent talent of Indians by placing restrictions like the licence raj.
With PTI inputs.
