Digital India turns four: PM Narendra Modi lauds initiative, says it has empowered people and reduced corruption

On the fourth anniversary of Narendra Modi government's flagship programme 'Digital India', Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Monday said that the initiative has empowered people, reduced corruption and improved public service delivery to benefit the poor."On this day, four years ago, Digital India was launched, to leverage the power of technology and make technology more accessible. Digital India has empowered people, significantly reduced corruption and improved public service delivery to benefit the poor #DigitalIndiaNewIndia," he tweeted."The Digital India initiative is a people's movement, powered by people's strength and their efforts to learn as well as innovate. I salute all those assiduously working to strengthen Digital India and wish them the very best for their future efforts," Modi said in another tweet.

The programme was launched on 1 July, 2015, by the Government of India with a vision to transform India into a digitally empowered society and knowledge economy.Digital India, which is the focal point of Modi's 'New India' push, is centred on three key vision areas — Digital Infrastructure as a Utility to Every Citizen and Governance and Services on Demand, and Digital Empowerment of Citizens.Taking to Twitter, Union Minister Ravi Shankar Prasad said that the programme is now finding global resonance."PM Narendra Modi had launched Digital India on 1 July, 2015. The success of Digital India is an inspiring story of inclusion, transformation, growth and empowerment through digital technologies, which is now finding global resonance," Prasad tweeted.

Highlighting the success of the programme, Prasad said that 3.65 lakh Common Service centres have been opened and 123 crore Aadhaar were generated.He said that there are currently 2.39 crore users of Digilocker, which is online space to store documents.Prasad also lauded BHIM-UPI, a unified payments interface, and said it is a "unique fintech innovation" of India that has transformed the digital payment ecosystem. "It was made it possible to make payments using a simple and easy-to-use mobile app," he said.The Union Minister further said that Rs 7.45 lakh crore has been transferred through total Direct Benefit Transfer.