Tamil Nadu: PM Modi awards honorary doctorate to musician Ilaiyaraaja, remembers Gandhi at Gandhigram University

Chennai: Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Friday presented honorary doctorates to renowned musicians, Ilayaraja and Umayalpuram K. Sivaraman at the Gandhigram Rural Institute in Tamil Nadu city Dindigul.

Ilayaraja -- a renowned Tamil and south Indian music composer, is a widely respected personality in the world of music, while Umayalpuram K. Sivaraman is a noted instrumentalist in southern India.

The Prime Minister, who arrived in Madurai on a special aircraft from Bengalur, was received at the airport by Tamil Nadu Governor R.N. Ravi, Ministers K.K.S.S.R. Ramachandran, Thangam Thenarassu, Moorthy, former Chief Ministers K. Palaniswami, O. Panneerselvam, among others.

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Senior leaders of the BJP and the AIADMK were also present at the airport to receive PM Modi.

Modi then proceeded to Gandhigram Rural institute in a helicopter with Governor Ravi accompanying him.

The Prime Minister was received at the helipad by Tamil Nadu Chief Minister M.K. Stalin, Union Minister of State for Information and Broadcasting, L. Murugan, among others.

PM Modi said that Gandhian values are becoming increasingly relevant and further added that Gandhian ideals are valid in ending conflicts as well as in climate crisis. Modi also highlighted Mahatma Gandhi's ideals have solutions to many of the issues faced by the world, while speaking at the 36th convocation ceremony of Gandhigram Rural institute in Dindigul. Modi said that Gandhigram Rural Institute was inaugurated by Mahatma Gandhi himself and one can see the spirit of his ideals at the institute.

"Khadi was forgotten for a long but through the call 'Khadi for Nation, Khadi for Fashion', it has become very popular," he said.

The Prime Minister said that Mahatma Gandhi had seen Khadi as a tool of self-reliance in villages, and through the self-reliance of villages he had sown the seed for a self-reliant India.

Modi said that Atmanirbhar Bharat was an idea inspired by Mahatma Gandhi's self-reliant villages concept.

"You are the builders of new India. You have the responsibility to take India to its Amrit Kaal, the next 25 years," he told students who attended the convocation ceremony.

PM Modi shared the dais at Gandhigram University with Governor R.N. Ravi and CM MK Stalin amid a tussle between the ruling DMK government and Ravi over a number of issues, including the bill on NEET exemption for Tamil Nadu.