Highlights: PM Modi inaugurates Purvanchal Expressway, says 'it will unite UP'

The six-lane Purvanchal Expressway, which extends from Chandsarai village in Lucknow to Haidaria village on National Highway 31 in Ghazipur, was inaugurated by Prime Minister NarendraModi on Tuesday.

The Purvanchal Expressway, which is expected to cost around Rs 22,500 crore, will boost the economic development of eastern Uttar Pradesh, particularly the districts of Lucknow, Barabanki,Amethi, Ayodhya, Sultanpur, Ambedkar Nagar, Azamgarh, Mau, and Ghazipur, according to the statement.

Highlights of the event

• Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s C-130J Super Hercules landed at Karwal Kheri in Sultanpur district at around 1:20 pm.

• While addressing the crowd present at the event, PM said, "When I laid the foundation stone of Purvanchal Expressway 3 years back, I had never thought that I will land here onan aircraft one day."

• “The highway will unite UP. Poor, middle class, farmers and traders- all will benefit from this highway."

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• Slamming the former governments, PM said, “the politics in UP, and the way that governments were run for a long time, did not pay attention to the state's overarching andholistic development. One region of Uttar Pradesh and its people were handed over to the mafia and poverty. I'm glad that this region is starting a new chapter in its development today.

• “As a member of Parliament from the state of Uttar Pradesh, I have developed a rapport with citizens. People of Uttar Pradesh will permanently remove them from the path of thestate's development because of the way they discriminated and only cared about their own family... you did this in 2017," said PM Modi referring to upcoming state elections in 2022.

• “For UP, I spearheaded a series of projects. Poor people were given pucca houses, toilets were installed in their homes so that women didn't have to go outside to relievethemselves, and every house was provided,” said PM.

• The Prime Minister also backed CM Yogi Adityanath, who had been rebuked for his handling of the Covid second wave, saying, "In the last four years, the state has built thousandsof kilometres of roads, and medical colleges have been established. So far, the state has distributed over 14 crore vaccine doses."

• A Mirage 2000 landing on a 3.2 km emergency airstrip and a servicing demonstration was also witnessed by the Prime Minister today. Troops were landed on the airstrip by an AN-32 transportplane. Three Kiran Mk2s flew overhead, flanked by two Sukhoi 30 jets.