Right after Narendra Modi became Prime Minister,he created record by visiting various countries. His foreign trips always created controversies with opposition parties blasting him for wasting public money and achieving nothing in return.However PM Modi’s planning shocked all. Inorder to save public money, he started saving time on foreign tours by sleeping in the plane itself.
It is comingout PM Modi is aiming to sleep on the plane rather than stay in foreign hotels inorder to shorten his trips.IN his recent trips to Belgium, US and Saudi Arabia between March 30 and April 2, Narendra Modi spent three nights on Air India One – while in transit from Delhi to Brussels, from Brussels to Washington DC and from there to Riyadh.He spent only two nights at hotels, one in Washington and one in Riyadh. A government official remarked “It is unprecedented to complete a PM’s multinational trip involving US in just 97 hours. If the PM had not chosen to sleep on the plane, we would not have been back for at least six days,”
Former PM Manmohan Singh’s visits used to be longer and largely summit-related with single-city engagements. In his first two years, Modi as the PM would have spent 95 days abroad much more than Singh’s 72 days abroad in his first two years in UPA-1and UPA-2. But Modi has covered far more ground by visiting 40 countries in his 20 trips. Singh could visit 18 countries in 15 trips in UPA-1and 24 countries in 17 trips in UPA-2 in the first two years.Modi willnot sleep fully even in planes but will be planning his schedules for the next day.
An official revealed “A night should be spent in a foreign hotel only if there is an engagement scheduled the next day,” an official explained Modi’s line of thought. On April 1, the PM was in Nuclear Security Summit till 5 pm.He reached the airport straight from the venue to fly out of Riyadh at 7 pm. He slept on the 12-hour flight again to save a day. Modi arrived there on April 2 afternoon, spent the night and held talks the next day. At 7 pm on April 3, the PM flew back and arrived at Race Course Road at 2 am. He had meetings scheduled the nextmorning. But what about jet-lag of travel to-and-fro US time zones? “Before jet lag hits reverse jet lag comes into force,”
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