The government and the BJP on Saturday celebrated nine years of the Narendra Modi government by tom-tomming the Prime Minister’s domestic achievements and his emergence as the “most popular world leader”.

The government organised a daylong conclave on the themes of seva (service), sushasan (good governance) and gareeb kalyan (welfare for the poor), where ministers heaped praise on the Prime Minister. They claimed Modi had transformed the country’s image and put it on the world map.

Information and broadcasting minister Anurag Thakur narrated how a certain poor girl from his rural constituency in Himachal Pradesh lived in abject poverty till 2014 but now had a pucca house, LPG connection, piped drinking water and a toilet.

“This is the transformation that the Modi government has brought in the last nine years,” Thakur said, drawing applause from the audience in Vigyan Bhavan.

Several industry bigwigs, academics and domain experts had been invited to the conclave, and they too lauded Modi and his government’s achievements.

Home minister Amit Shah was to inaugurate the conclave but was held back by a Niti Aayog meeting. Railway and IT minister Ashwani Vaishnaw filled in for him.

Vaishnaw accused the previous UPA government of engaging in the “politics of appeasement” and claimed that the Modi government’s welfare schemes had empowered every Indian.

The BJP too has since Thursday been organising a series of power-point presentations by ministers, followed by informal interactions with the media, to compare the UPA’s 10 years with Modi’s nine.

Slides with captions have been displayed during the presentations showing Papua New Guinea Premier James Marape touching Modi’s feet, Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese saying “PM Modi is boss” and Italy Premier Giorgia Meloni terming Modi the “most loved of all world leaders”.

Among the slides used to highlight the “inclusive, progressive and sustainable” developments carried out by the Modi government has been a series on the construction of a “grand Ram temple” in Ayodhya.

Modi will be seeking a third term during next year’s Lok Sabha polls, and the BJP’s main planks are likely to include the successful construction of the Ram temple and the Prime Minister’s global stature.