Srinagar: Continuing with his tradition of celebrating the auspicious festivel of Deepawali with soldiers, Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Sunday celebrated the festival of lights with soldiers near Line of Control (LoC) in Jammu and Kashmir’s Rajouri district.
Modi visited the “Hall of Fame” in Rajouri where he paid homage to the soldiers and citizens, who laid down their lives to protect Rajouri and Poonch sectors. PM termed the Hall of fame as “Parakram Bhoomi, Prerna Bhoomi, and Paavan Bhoomi “.
While meeting the soldiers, PM Modi distributed sweets to the soldiers to mark the auspicious occasion.
“Celebrated Diwali with the brave soldiers of the Indian Army in Rajouri, Jammu and Kashmir. It is always a matter of great joy to be able to interact with these courageous personnel,” PM Modi tweeted.
Modi, while addressing the soldiers, said that everyone endeavours to travel far and wide to celebrate the festival of Diwali with family members and likewise he too traveled to be with the members of his family, the brave Jawans of the Armed Forces.
Prime Minister recalled the valour and supreme sacrifices made by the Armed forces in October 27 1947, which is also celebrated as infantry day.
Prime Minister also listed the steps being taken by the Government to further strengthen and modernize the Indian defence forces. He added that the Government is committed to taking steps to ensure the welfare of soldiers.
To pay homage and mark their contributions, the government endeavoured to engrave the landmark National War Memorial in the Capital, the Prime Minister said adding that the increasing number of visitors to the Memorial shows the respect accorded by the citizens towards the contributions of armed forces.
The prime minister arrived in Rajouri at around noon on Sunday and this is his first visit to the Kashmir valley after the Centre’s decision wherein Article 370 was abrogated by the parliament On August 5. The said Article was temporary and transient in the constitution, had granted special status to the erstwhile state of Jammu and Kashmir.
PM Modi’s visit to the LoC coincided with Infantry Day celebrations, which is observed to mark the landing of first Indian troops in Jammu and Kashmir in 1947 to push back Pakistan-supported intruders.
It may be mentioned here that this was for the 6th time that PM Modi visited Jammu and Kashmir to celebrate Diwali with the troops in the border state. PM Modi had started the practice of interacting with troops serving in tough areas on Diwali soon after taking over as the prime minister in 2014 when he had spent his Diwali at Siachen in Ladakh region with the jawans, besides visiting the flood victims in Srinagar.
It may be recalled that in 2018, the prime minister had celebrated Diwali with ITBP personnel stationed on the India-China border. During his address in 2018, PM Modi had said, “His passion for doing duty on snowy mountains in far-flung areas makes the nation’s strength stronger.”
Later, before returning to the national capital, Prime Minister also visited the Pathankot Airbase to meet the brave air warriors of Indian Air Force (IAF).