New Delhi, Sep 13 (UNI) Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Sunday dedicated to the nation three key projects related to the Petroleum sector in Bihar via video conferencing. The projects include the Durgapur-Banka section of the Paradip-Haldia-Durgapur Pipeline Augmentation Project and two LPG Bottling Plants. They have been commissioned by IndianOil and HPCL, PSUs under the aegis of the Ministry of Petroleum and Natural Gas.
Speaking on the occasion, the Prime Minister said the special package announced for Bihar a few years ago, focused much on the state’s infrastructure. He said the special package given for Bihar had 10 big projects related to petroleum and gas worth Rs 21 thousand crore.
Among these today it is the seventh project which is being dedicated to the people of Bihar. He also listed the other six projects which had been completed in Bihar earlier. He expressed happiness that he is inaugurating the Durgapur-Banka section (about 200 km) of an important gas pipeline project for which he laid the foundation stone about one and a half years ago.
He lauded the hard work of the engineers and laborers and active support of the state government for completing this project on time, in spite of the challenging terrain. He lauded the Chief Minister of Bihar for playing a big role in making Bihar come out of the work culture in which one generation used to start the work and the other generation completed it. He said this new work culture needs to be strengthened and it can take Bihar and East India on the development path.
The Prime Minister quoted from the scriptures “सामर्थ्य मूलं स्वातंत्र्यम्, श्रम मूलं वैभवम् ।” meaning that ‘strength is the source of freedom and power of labour is the basis of development of any nation’.
He said there is neither a shortage of power of labour in eastern India, including Bihar, nor does this place lack natural resources.
‘Despite this, Bihar and East India remained behind in terms of development for decades and suffered endless delays due to political, economic reasons and other priorities,’ he said.
He said since road connectivity, rail connectivity, air connectivity, internet connectivity were not a priority earlier, gas based industry and petro-connectivity could not be imagined in Bihar. He said development of gas based industries was a major challenge in Bihar due to it being a landlocked state and thus lacking resources related to petroleum and gas which are otherwise available in the states adjacent to the sea.
