Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Thursday said that India has witnessed transformative growth across sectors in the last 12 years and beyond economic growth, the country’s journey is about empowering people and transforming lives.
Addressing members of the Indian diaspora here, PM Modi said 25 crore people have been brought out of poverty.
“Over the past 12 years, India’s exports have increased 35-fold. The country’s mobile manufacturing units have experienced a remarkable 100-fold growth, making India the world’s second-largest mobile manufacturer. Fuelled by this rapid progress and development, India now stands as the fastest-growing major economy,” he said.
PM Modi said serving the country as an elected PM for 12 consecutive years has been a great privilege of his life
“It is the power of India’s democracy that has brought a tea seller to this position. The last 12 years have been a testament to the incredible potential of 1.4 billion Indians. In this period, India’s GDP has doubled. The number of airports has doubled. The number of universities has also doubled. Highway construction has doubled,” he said.
The Prime Minister also lauded the contributions of the Indian diaspora.
“When I arrived in Nice on June 14th, the first thing I did was participate in the Bharat Innovates program. Today, as I prepare to return from France, I feel as if I have come to the Bharat Connect program. The way you have connected the 21st-century India-France relationship, it is becoming a major strength of our strategic partnership. I bring to you the greetings of 1.4 billion Indian citizens. I express my heartfelt gratitude to all of you for this warm welcome,” he said.
“Paris is a city of lights. This is the city of colours. There are ideas and there is inspiration for innovation. All of you, coming from different states of India, make this city even more beautiful. You fill it with new colours. Some are Tamil, some are Punjabi, some are Gujarati, some are Marathi, and some are Bengali. Every corner of India is represented here,” he added.
Earlier in the day, PM Modi, accompanied by French President Emmanual Macron, participated in VivaTech 2026 in Paris, Europe’s largest technology and start-up event.
Addressing the gathering of tech-entrepreneurs, start-ups, investors and business leaders, the Prime Minister highlighted India’s vision for a human-centric AI and frontier technologies, and the growing expanse of India-France cooperation in emerging technologies.
He noted that technology had enabled transformative changes in India, from digital payments, AI-enabled agricultural progress to cutting-edge space applications. Following the keynote address, Prime Minister Modi and President Macron interacted with Indian start-ups and innovators displaying frontier technologies and practical solutions for industry, healthcare, sustainability, and mobility.
India is the AI Country Partner in VivaTech 2026. This is also India’s largest ever presence at VivaTech with pavilions set up to showcase its innovation ecosystem across Artificial Intelligence, digital public infrastructure, health-tech, clean technologies, mobility, advanced computing, etc. Over 80 Indian deep-tech companies and start-ups are participating in the event.
Prime Minister’s participation at VivaTech is expected to further deepen partnerships between Indian and French technology ecosystems.
India has had a growing engagement with VivaTech over the years. This year’s participation by India assumes significance as the two countries are celebrating 2026 as the India-France Year of Innovation.
(ANI)
