Modi met chief ministers and lieutenant governors of 21 states and Union territories, including Punjab, Kerala, Uttarakhand and northestern states on Tuesday.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Tuesday asserted that ‘green shoots’ had started to emerge in the economy and called for the need to focus on both lives and livelihood while ensuring that economic activity gathered pace, with the lifting of various lockdown-related curbs over the past two weeks.

Taking stock of the situation with chief ministers of various states via video-conference following the Unlock 1.0, the Prime Minister said: “Green shoots have begun to emerge in the economy, power consumption has begun to go up, fertiliser sale in May has been double that of May last year; kharif crop, two-wheeler production, digital payments too showing positive signs.”

Modi met chief ministers and lieutenant governors of 21 states and Union territories, including Punjab, Kerala, Uttarakhand and northestern states on Tuesday. On Wednesday, the Prime Minister is scheduled to meet chief ministers of another 15 states (relatively large ones), including Maharashtra, Uttar Pradesh, Tamil Nadu, Rajasthan and Gujarat.

He also exhorted the states to work together on strengthening value chains to revive trade and industry. “The more we are able to contain the spread of Covid-19, the more we will be able to open up our economy, markets, offices, transport modes and the more new job opportunities will emerge,” he said.

At the same time, Modi also highlighted the need to to follow all precautions such as wearing masks, maintaining physical distance and cautioned against any laxity.

Stressing that the country’s recovery rate has exceeded 50%, the Prime Minister said India is now among those countries where the number of death is among the least, even though the government considers every death as unfortunate and sad. Timely decisions have helped the country contain the fury of the pandemic, he added.

“Thousands of Indians have returned home from abroad, lakhs of migrant workers have reached their villages; rail, road, air and sea routes have been opened, even then, despite having such a big population, Covid-19 has not spread as much as in some countries,” Modi said. “When India’s fight is examined in future, how we fought this together, providing a fine example of cooperative federalism, will be noted,” he said.

According to the health ministry data, India has 1,53,178 active Covid cases, while 1,80,012 people have been cured and 9,900 people have died of the pandemic.

“Two weeks of the Unlock 1.0 has shown that if we follow rules and guidelines, there will be minimal harm due to Covid-19,” he added. “If we ensure through bankers’ committees that enterprises get prompt credit, it will help them resume operations and provide employment to people,” the Prime Minister said.

The Prime Minister also shed light on various relief measures for critical sectors of the economy under the recently-announced Rs 21 lakh crore package, including for MSMEs, agriculture, horticulture and fisheries. The package includes collateral-free, extra working capital loans for MSMEs (up to 20%) with official guarantee, which is expected to benefit 45 lakh MSME units.