Foreign Minister of France calls on PM, invites him to visit France

Published By : Admin | July 1, 2014 | 18:20 IST

The Foreign Minister of France, Mr. Laurent Fabius, called on the Prime Minister, Shri Narendra Modi today, and invited him to visit France. Both sides reiterated their commitment to further strengthen and expand the bilateral relationship. 
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Welcoming the Minister, Shri Modi remarked that yesterday he had an opportunity to witness the launch of the French satellite, SPOT-7, which was placed in orbit by the Polar Satellite Launch Vehicle from Sriharikota. 

Recalling the strategic and friendly ties between the two countries, the Prime Minister sought French cooperation in the field of urban planning and heritage conservation. Observing that France had provided technical support for the Ahmedabad Heritage Project, Shri Modi said India planned to build heritage cities and 100 new smart cities. France has the expertise to help us in this regard, he added. 

The Prime Minister also sought French cooperation in the fields of tourism, skill development and low-cost defence manufacturing. 

The French Foreign Minister said France was keen to expand the cooperation and the relationship, following the assumption of office by the new Government in India. He discussed the student exchange programme, and further deepening of the technological cooperation between the two countries. The issue of terrorism also figured in the talks. 

The meeting was attended by Smt. Sushma Swaraj, External Affairs Minister; Shri Ajit Doval, the National Security Adviser, Smt. Sujatha Singh, Foreign Secretary; Shri Arun Singh, Ambassador of India to France; Mr. Francois Richier, Ambassador of France to India, and other officials.

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Prime Minister Shri Narendra Modi chaired the 53rd meeting of PRAGATI, the ICT-enabled, multi-modal platform for Pro-Active Governance and Timely Implementation, at Seva Teerth earlier today.

During the meeting, Prime Minister reviewed six key infrastructure projects across the Railway, Road and Power sectors, spanning nine States with a cumulative cost of more than ₹30,000 crore. The projects, significant for strengthening connectivity, supporting industrial and economic activity and improving public services, were reviewed with particular emphasis on adherence to timelines, inter-agency coordination, resolution of pending issues and expeditious completion.

Prime Minister emphasised that delays in infrastructure projects have consequences beyond cost escalation, as they also postpone the benefits intended for citizens, businesses and the economy. He said that infrastructure projects should be viewed and monitored as an integrated whole, rather than as isolated sections, stretches or packages. He noted that progress in individual packages should ultimately translate into timely completion and operationalisation of the entire project. Ministries and States were therefore asked to adopt an end-to-end approach, and address critical gaps that could delay the overall commissioning and delivery of benefits. He called for fostering a proactive work culture across Ministries and State Governments, with greater ownership at every level of project implementation.

Prime Minister stressed the need to explore common utility corridors for infrastructure services, wherever feasible, particularly while planning major transport and infrastructure projects. He called upon Ministries and States to examine such integrated approaches at the planning stage itself, keeping in view their technical and economic feasibility.

Prime Minister said that speed of execution must be accompanied by uncompromising quality. He called upon Ministries, States and implementing agencies to adopt modern technologies and strengthen quality assurance and supervision at every stage.

While reviewing AgriStack under the Digital Agriculture Mission, Prime Minister emphasised the need to leverage the latest digital technologies, including Artificial Intelligence, to derive greater value from agricultural data. He stressed that the data ecosystem should be effectively utilised across the agricultural value chain, from input planning to processing, enabling more informed interventions, better targeting and data-driven decision-making. He appreciated the efforts of the States and the Central Government in building the AgriStack ecosystem and called for further strengthening its use for delivering better outcomes for farmers.

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