I am still fairly confident we will come out better than the West in terms of our overall development versus damage.

I'm not crying over surplus capacity... Surplus capacity is good for India. Surplus capacity means we can get more investors, can get more households and promise them 24/7 power.

I have told many times I am always a student willing to learn new things.

I have very often held a view - and I am public about it - that if you run your operations inefficiently, you can't expect your consumer to pay for your inefficiencies.

As more and more money is coming into the formal economy, one can look at more attractive tax rates and lower tax slabs. Even if half the people who were in the informal sector move in to the formal economy and more taxes get collected, more money can be spent on the welfare.

Centrally, I cannot interfere in states.

I like to set aggressive targets; without them, you will get ordinary performances.

Indians have become very demanding. Gone are the days where you could get away with power outages.

UDAY is meant for financial and operational turnaround of discoms.

I can't tell the people of India that we'll burden you with high costs because the West has polluted the world, now India will pay for it. Not acceptable to us.

I want to reignite the interest in hydro-electric investments.

Western countries can cut down coal and replace it by renewables; I will need to have more coal.

My solar energy programme alone will generate about a million jobs.

Under Prime Minister Narendra Modi, we are looking to make India self-reliant in terms of power requirement, along with providing carbon-free sources of power, thus improving India's position globally.

Wind developers have realised the importance of transparent method of price discovery, which was demonstrated in the solar sector. They realise that bidding brings in efficiency, and tariff is right-sized.

You have to decide that you will be the best.

The speed of decision making is the essence of good governance.

Electricity can transform people's lives, not just economically but also socially.

You can fool the people once, twice, but you can't fool them all the time. You should tell them honestly what you can do for them.

Even a poor man doesn't ask alms unless he sees you have the ability to give.

I don't get carried away by any praise; I know I have miles to go.

Western countries have gone through their development cycle and enjoyed the fruits of ruining the environment over many years and are now giving us homilies and pontificating on responsibilities to the environment. I think they need to look inward.

Solar growth will support landowners to derive income and solar industry to build their business.

It is important to take into account the total power cost borne by consumers after taking into account what they spend on inverters and gensets.

Corruption is the by-product of discretion when there is scope for interpretation of policies.

We aim to encourage investments that ease our supply-side bottlenecks, such as rural roads, cold-storage, and grain-warehouses, which will also help us combat inflation.

By using LED bulbs, one can contribute, in their way, to overcome global warming.

PM Modi has provided visionary leadership with his focus on the welfare of the poor and inclusive nature taking along his whole team, including states, parties, all schools of thought, all sections of society.

I trust the regulatory mechanism; it is a fair and independent mechanism, and the politicians and government do not interfere with the regulators.

The 100 gigawatt target for solar should not be a constraint. India won't stop at 100 GW.

I am very friendly with the people of India, and corporates are also a part of that.

Unless you empower your domestic investor and domestic industry and domestic confidence in the sector, no foreigner is going to come.

Gujaratis are smart people.

If inflation is brought down, interest rates will fall. Once rates fall, we have the opportunity to maybe achieve the goal of 'housing for all' faster; take roads, infrastructure to India's interiors.

Renewable energy is not more expensive than fossil fuel when you factor in life-cycle costs.

People of India deserve to be complimented for making the 2014 elections a referendum on the misrule of the Congress-led UPA and demonstrating their faith in a proven new leadership.

Extra capacity makes manufacturing competitive, keeps pricing in control.

Allocating coal linkage to a generating company rather than to a specific plant gives companies the freedom to use the fuel in the most efficient way.

I believe investigative agencies should be run in an autonomous manner, and there shouldn't be any interference from the government's side.

I feel there is huge potential for India and the U.K. to work together both on the technology space and on the investment space.

We cannot have a system that everything can be passed on to the final consumer in the garb of cost being recovered without being sensitive to their own problems and affordability.

Politics is involved when you don't tackle inefficiency and burden people with higher tariffs.

More taxes mean more money to spend for public welfare.

Ramifications of small decisions can be pretty large.

I can't tell my people that you will get power only from 6 A.M. to 5 P.M., and after that, we live in darkness. You need 24-hour power; you need a baseload, and that baseload for India is coal. We are looking at clean coal technologies to reduce the impact of pollution.

I will reach out to all states uniformly... I can assure you I will take two steps for every step they extend.

I don't interfere with regulators.

If you are moving the informal economy into the formal economy, and if the transactions which for years were never reported as part of GDP are now transacted through banking channels, it will only add to the GDP, not reduce the GDP.

When PM goes for a foreign visit, he represents a country and not the party.

I can't inject renewables into a grid that doesn't have base load.