In I-Day speech, CM salutes healthcare, frontline workers

In his Independence Day speech from the lawns of the Delhi Secretariat, Kejriwal further elaborated on Delhi’s experience with Covid-19 pandemic while appreciating the role of healthcare and frontline workers in fighting the pandemic.

Delhi chief minister Arvind Kejriwal on Sunday announced the roll out of the Deshbhakti (patriotism) curriculum from September 27 in government-run schools in the city and Yoga programme at public parks and community halls on October 2. These programmes were mentioned in the Delhi budget 2021-22 presented by the Kejriwal government.

Delhi chief minister Arvind Kejriwal addresses a gathering during the 75th Independence Day celebration at Delhi Secretariat in New Delhi (PTI Photo)

In his Independence Day speech from the lawns of the Delhi Secretariat, Kejriwal further elaborated on Delhi’s experience with Covid-19 pandemic while appreciating the role of healthcare and frontline workers in fighting the pandemic. He also highlighted the Aam Aadmi Party’s (AAP) efforts to enhance public welfare services and act as a role model for other states.

“For the last 1.5 years, people are facing the brunt of the Covid-19 pandemic and a large number of doctors, paramedics and frontline workers have lost their lives. India has witnessed two waves of Covid-19. Delhi has witnessed four – in June 2020, September 2020, November 2020 and April 2021. The April wave in Delhi was the most dangerous. There will hardly be any family in Delhi which has not seen infection among relatives. So many of them lost their loved ones. It was an emotional phase for us. Our ministers, MLAs, officers worked 24x7 to save lives,” said Kejriwal in Sunday’s speech.

At its peak, Delhi recorded more than 28,300 new Covid-19 cases in 24-hours on April 20 and a positivity rate of more than 36% on April 22. The Covid-19 surge left the city’s healthcare system overburdened, which was worsened by a severe crisis of oxygen, resulting in a high number of deaths.

The chief minister further said, “I salute the doctors, nurses and paramedics who served us with utmost dedication. They are no less than a soldier. There was an existing Delhi government scheme to help martyred soldiers’ kin with ₹1 crore in financial assistance. We extended the same scheme to healthcare and frontline workers. Lives of people are priceless. This amount is the minimum token of gratitude for their service to the people of Delhi. Delhi government stands with the patients too.”

“The children who have been orphaned are our children. We can’t abandon them. We have made a scheme for them too. We have also made a scheme for those who lost breadwinners,” said Kejriwal – referring to financial assistance schemes under which children orphaned by Covid-19 and households losing their primary breadwinners in Delhi are entitled to a monthly financial assistance of ₹2,500.

Highlighting the AAP government’s role in the education sector, the chief minister said: “In 74 years, in schools of our country, we have taught physics, chemistry, maths, history but not patriotism. We assumed that students would learn that themselves. I am happy to announce such a curriculum in Delhi’s schools to encourage our students to take pride in the nation. This will be a completely activity-based programme to make children understand their roles and duties as a responsible citizen. Every child will be prepared to contribute to nation building and sacrifice everything for the nation. There is no better day to start the programme than Bhagat Singh’s birth anniversary. He had sacrificed his life for the nation at the age of 23. I also urge parents to discuss patriotism and responsibilities with children when they are home.” Bhagat Singh’s birth anniversary is on September 27.

Kejriwal said he was happy to announce that the Delhi board of school education has signed a MoU (memorandum of agreement) with the international board to offer a much sought after and internationally recognised curriculum in the city schools.

Kejriwal also claimed that Delhi had become a good governance laboratory under his party’s rule. He said his government recognised its responsibility to provide quality basic services including education, healthcare, water and electricity to residents and the AAP government’s model was now being adopted by other political outfits.

“We are doing experiments on every aspect of governance. Recently we made the regional transport offices provide all services online—no queue, no crowd, no loss of working day, no touts. If one does not know how to use the internet, just call 1076. We started with the transport department. Slowly, we will provide all government services online. In recent years, we launched the doorstep delivery model – which has more than 150 services now. In schools we launched a happiness class aimed at meditation, positivity, encouragement. We launched entrepreneurship classes,” he said, naming a few initiatives of the government.

Highlighting the importance of Yoga and meditation along with Gandhian values, Kejriwal said, “We have to make Yoga a part of people’s life. This year from October 2, the birth anniversary of Mahatma Gandhi, we will launch a programme of Yoga classes in parks and community centres. We are training a large number of yoga instructors for the programme. If groups of residents of any colony ask us about instructors, we will help them under the programme.”

He further spoke of his ambitions to bring Delhi’s per capita income at par with Singapore’s and bidding for the Olympics in 2048, promises made during the budget session of the assembly earlier this year.