Vijaya Dashami Address: 650 Antiquities Returned in 12 Years

Prime Minister Narendra Modi took part in the Vijaya Dashami celebrations at Ramlila Maidan in Delhi on 20 October 2026. Alongside the festive greetings, his address carried several facts that an aspirant can be questioned on: a repatriation figure for stolen antiquities, a fresh UNESCO listing for an Indian festival, and a governance formula drawn from the idea of Ramrajya.

Antiquities brought home

The most quotable number of the evening concerned heritage recovery. The Prime Minister said that more than 650 ancient idols have been returned to the country in the preceding 12 years. He placed this against the long stretch in which sculptures and relics were taken out of India, and argued that a nation advances only when it carries a settled sense of self-respect, which in turn rests on its inherited culture.

UNESCO listings

He next turned to global recognition for Indian cultural sites. A number of places in the country have been written into the UNESCO World Heritage list in recent years, he said. He added that Deepavali was taken on to UNESCO's Intangible Cultural Heritage of Humanity list in the previous year, and credited that outcome to the combined willpower of crores of Indians rather than to any single effort.

Ramrajya as a governance yardstick

Describing the rule established after Lord Ram's return to Ayodhya, the Prime Minister called Ramrajya a benchmark for administration in which nobody faces discrimination, everybody receives justice and equal opportunity, and authority exists for public welfare instead of command. He cited Goswami Tulsidas on the absence of suffering under such a rule, and asked the administration to work by the mantra of Nagrik Devo Bhava, treating the citizen as divine, with service of the poor and the deprived kept above everything else.

Self-reliance and Nation First

From Lord Ram's crossing to Lanka he drew a lesson in self-reliance: rather than depending on others in a crisis, collective public participation was awakened and available resources were pooled. He asked citizens to apply that method to the goals of a Viksit Bharat and an Aatmanirbhar Bharat. Quoting the Vedic line on shared counsel, he urged every institution and political party to stand together in the national interest, and called for a Nation First pledge against forces that hurt national honour, split society or despise Indian culture. He closed by recalling the resolutions of the Pran Pratishtha ceremony at the Ayodhya temple and the vision of 'Ram Se Rashtra' and 'Dev Se Desh'.