India’s development needs to be inclusive, ecologically sustainable: Rajnath Singh

Says Centre to establish 100 new Sainik Schools to improve education quality

Pathanamthitta : Defence Minister Rajnath Singh on Wednesday said that India’s development needs to be inclusive, equitable, ecologically sustainable and morally desirable and that the Centre remains committed to a climate resilient future.Singh said the country was fast developing and therefore, its consumption “should be need-based and not greed-based” and for this our behaviours need to change to ensure sustainability. There is a need to do away with the “use-and-dispose economy”, he said.

The Defence Minister was speaking after inaugurating the closing ceremony of poet, environmentalist and human rights activist Sugathakumari’s 90th birth anniversary celebrations in Pathnamthitta district of the state.Speaking at the event, he said, “India is a fast-developing country, but its development needs to be inclusive, equitable, ecologically sustainable and morally desirable without compromising the planet’s health.”

He described Sugathakumari as not just a poet but a “conscience-keeper of the society” as her work — “imbued with emotional empathy, humanist sensitivity, and moral alertness” — became a vehicle to address societal and environmental concerns.Referring to the citizens fundamental duty to protect and improve the natural environment, Singh said humanity was to be “the trustee of natural resources” but “never the master”.

“Nature was never to be exploited but revered, worshipped and utilised without wastage. We, as human beings, were supposed to be the intelligent species.”But we took many wrong turns in our journey. Thankfully, we had people like Sughathakumari ji who served the mother nature like her true child,” he said.

He listed out the various green initiatives, like Mission Life, Pro-Planet People, National Green Hyrdrogen Mission, Green Credit Programme and ‘Ek Ped Maa Ke Naam’, taken by the Central government under the leadership of Prime Minister Narendra Modi to improve and safeguard the environment.Singh further said that despite the country’s developmental needs and contributing minimally to global warming historically, India was committed to a “sustainable and climate-resilient future”.

“Our commitment to save the environment has started yielding positive results. The ‘India State of Forest Report’ which was released last year in December, showed that the total forest and tree cover of the country has been continuously increasing,” he claimed.He contended that while developed countries “bickered over semantics”, India was taking swift action to fight climate change which has caused extreme weather events — like the landslides in Wayanad and floods in Himachal Pradesh, Uttarakhand and Sikkim — in the country.

Giving an example of the action being taken, Singh said that at the Mahakumbh 2025, “the Miyawaki technique is being used for tree planting”.”Dense forests have been created at various sites across Prayagraj to ensure clean air and a healthy environment for the millions of devotees,” he claimed.The minister said that governments and international organisations across the globe have taken various measures to come up with innovative solutions to transition towards a low-carbon development strategy and deal with the challenge of climate change.

However, this adaptation is very complex and requires a “multi-stakeholder approach where institutions and communities come together to mitigate, adapt and build resilience,” he said.Singh underscored the importance of the right to a healthy environment and be free from the adverse effects of climate change and said that failure to take measures to adapt and mitigate climate change would lead to catastrophic results.He stressed the need to carry forward the wisdom shown and the example set by people like Sugathakumari who died in December 2020.

Defence Minister Rajnath Singh on Wednesday said that the Centre’s decision to establish 100 new sainik schools across the country was part of its efforts to improve the quality of basic education in India, contributing to the overall development of the nation.After inaugurating the 47th annual day celebrations of the Vidyadhiraja Sainik School in Alappuzha, Singh stated that the Central government has also paved the way for the admission of girls to sainik schools.

He added that the Centre had decided to expand the reach of sainik schools to every region and district of India to include personnel from diverse cultural backgrounds and remote areas of the country.The Defence Minister, who is in Kerala for a couple of events, further emphasised that as the country moves towards self-reliance, with advancements in various sectors such as health, communication, industry, transport, and defence, “there is a need for a revolution in education and the holistic development of children.”

During his speech, he also remarked that a ‘sainik’ or soldier should not be seen solely from the perspective of war, as each soldier possesses many other qualities.He noted that a soldier is disciplined, focused on his goals, serves selflessly, has self-control, and is dedicated. These qualities are also seen in many great leaders, such as Swami Vivekananda, Adi Shankaracharya, and Raja Ravi Varma, whose battlefields were social, cultural, political, or religious reforms, he said.