Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Friday gave the longest Independence Day speech ever by an Indian Prime Minister for a record 103 minutes (1 hour 43 minutes) from the Red Fort.
The address started at 7:34 a.m. and ended at 9:17 a.m., breaking his own record last year when he addressed for 98 minutes (1 hour 38 minutes). Modi initially set the record in 2015 with an 88-minute (1 hour 28 minutes) speech, topping the previous record of 72 minutes held by Jawaharlal Nehru in 1947.
Since his first Independence Day speech in 2014, which lasted 65 minutes (1 hour 5 minutes), Modi’s addresses have varied in length—96 minutes in 2016, a notably shorter 56 minutes in 2017, 83 minutes in 2018, around 92 minutes in 2019, 90 minutes in 2020, 88 minutes in 2021, 74 minutes in 2022, and 90 minutes in 2023.
The 2017 address is his shortest. In 2017, during his 'Mann Ki Baat' radio broadcast, he reported that individuals had written to him indicating his speeches were "a little too long," so he kept it short on that day.
Friday’s address also saw Modi achieve another milestone—delivering his 12th consecutive Independence Day speech from the Red Fort—overtaking Indira Gandhi’s record of 11 in a row. He now stands second only to Jawaharlal Nehru, who gave 17 consecutive addresses.
Interestingly, Nehru and Gandhi also hold the record for the shortest Independence Day speeches—just 14 minutes each, in 1954 and 1966 respectively.
Even former Prime Ministers Manmohan Singh and Atal Bihari Vajpayee kept their addresses brief. Singh, who made 10 speeches in his tenure, tended to be close to the 50-minute level—only twice delivering exactly 50 minutes in 2005 and 2006.
His speeches were between 32 and 45 minutes in other years, the shortest being in 2012 and 2013 at 32 and 35 minutes. Vajpayee's 2002 and 2003 speeches were even shorter, lasting a mere 25 and 30 minutes respectively.
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