‘Didn’t know my show would be viewed politically’
Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Sunday said he had not thought that his monthly radio programme, ‘Mann Ki Baat’, would be viewed politically when it launched more than two years back.
The Prime Minister said through the programme he had “become like a member of every household” of the country, conversing with “my family” about routine issues.
“Some people take ‘Mann Ki Baat’ as a monologue and some criticise it from a political angle,” Mr Modi said in the first programme after the completion of three years of his government. He said that like “an ordinary citizen”, he too gets influenced by good or bad things.
“When I started ‘Mann Ki Baat’, I had not thought so,” he said about the programme launched on October 2, 2014. Through the programme, he said he felt like he was conversing with “my family while sitting at home”. He added that there are many families who have written to him these very
feelings. The Prime Minister then referred to the launch by President Pranab
Mukherjee of an analytical book on ‘Mann Ki Baat’ two days back.“As an ordinary citizen and as an individual, this was very inspirational event for me,” he said.
Talking about the book, he praised Akbar, an artist living in Abu Dhabi, who had offered to sketch the topics various episodes of ‘Mann Ki Baat’ without taking a single rupee. He also emphasised on the importance of preserving the environment and spoke about the importance of yoga and talked about freedom fighters.