A video showed the Prime Minister clapping and singing along as soldiers sang Vande Mataram
Prime Minister Narendra Modi today joined soldiers in singing Vande Mataram during his Diwali visit to Kargil.
A video showed the Prime Minister, in Army uniform, clapping and singing along as a group of soldiers sang Vande Mataram.
The Prime Minister, who visits soldiers posted at the country's borders every Diwali, is in Kargil this time.
Addressing the soldiers, the Prime Minister said they are his family and that he couldn't have had a better Diwali.
"All of you have been my family for years now. It is a privilege to spend Diwali with our brave jawans in Kargil," he said, while praising the soldiers for their bravery.
Peace is not possible without power, the Prime Minister said, while stressing that his government has always considered war as the last option. "We have always considered war as the last option. Whether it took place in Lanka or Kurukshetra, till the end, every effort was made to prevent it. We are in the favour of world peace," he said.
This is the ninth time -- since 2014, when he took over as Prime Minister -- when he visited soldiers on Diwali.
Last year, he visited soldiers at Nowshere in Jammu and Kashmir. In 2020, he was at Longewala post in Rajasthan and the year before that, he met soldiers in Rajouri. In 2018, Prime Minister Modi visited soldiers and paramilitary personnel posted at Harsil in Uttarakhand. In 2017, he went to Jammu and Kashmir's Bandipora on Diwali. The Prime Minister's 2016 Diwali was spent at Lahaul-Spiti in Himachal and the year before that he was at the Amritsar border. Shortly after coming to power, he had visited the Siachen post and met soldiers on Diwali.
Even during his term as Gujarat Chief Minister, the Prime Minister visited soldiers during the festival of lights.