Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Saturday underscored the urgency of building a self-reliant India, telling a gathering in Bhavnagar, Gujarat, that the country’s greatest challenge was not an external adversary but its reliance on others.
Speaking at a public event, Modi urged citizens to embrace the vision of Aatmanirbhar Bharat (self-reliant India), stressing that independence in every sector was vital for peace, prosperity, and stability.
“We have no major enemy in the world. Our only real enemy is our dependence on other countries,” he declared. “This is our biggest enemy, and together we must defeat it.”
The prime minister’s comments came shortly after U.S. President Donald Trump signed a proclamation imposing an annual fee of $100,000 on companies employing H-1B visa holders, a move that has implications for Indian professionals working abroad.
Self-reliance as a national mission
Modi described foreign dependence as “the nation’s failure” and insisted that a country of 1.4 billion people must produce for itself. “There is only one medicine for all of India’s problems, and that is self-reliance,” he said.
To drive the point home, he coined the phrase “from chips to ships,” urging industries to manufacture everything domestically, from semiconductors to vessels.
Maritime sector at the core
Highlighting India’s maritime strength, the prime minister called ports the “backbone of the nation” and announced reforms aimed at simplifying trade. “We are going to have new reforms for Indian ports. ‘One Nation, One Document’ and ‘One Nation, One Port Process’ will make trade easier,” he said.
He added that his government had taken a “historic decision” to classify large ships as infrastructure, a step he said would accelerate India’s rise as a global maritime hub.
Criticism of past policies
Modi also took aim at previous governments, particularly the Congress, accusing them of curbing the potential of Indians through restrictive measures such as the licence raj. In contrast, he framed his administration’s approach as one that unleashes innovation and empowers domestic enterprise.
