Covid-19 in Haryana: Congress hits out at BJP over pandemic situation

State Congress president Kumari Selja and state party in-charge Vinay Bansal, who were in the city, alleged that the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) gave a higher preference to fighting elections rather than working on upgrading healthcare and saving lives.

The state unit of the Congress on Tuesday accused the state and central governments of failing to handle the Covid-19 situation, with party members saying there was no plan in place to deal with the pandemic.

A man providing a swab sample for RT-PCR based Covid-19 testing at the Old Civil Hospital near MCG office, in Gurugram. (Parveen Kumar/HT Photo)

State Congress president Kumari Selja and state party in-charge Vinay Bansal, who were in the city, alleged that the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) gave a higher preference to fighting elections rather than working on upgrading healthcare and saving lives.

“The BJP government is not ready to listen to the woes of farmers and is bent upon handing over agriculture to corporates. The Central government has failed to meet Covid challenge and the people are dying because of lack of beds, medical oxygen and failure to vaccinate people,” said Selja.

Members of the BJP, however, said that the maximum failure on the Covid front happened in Punjab, Maharashtra and Delhi. “These states are worst affected. The Congress and opposition leaders were responsible for causing vaccine hesitation. The government is working on a plan and it is being executed,” said Raman Malik, BJP spokesperson.

Selja also criticised how the union health minister had replied to the suggestions made by former Prime Minister Manmohan Singh to manage the challenges posed by Covid-19. “The conduct of the BJP leadership was neither civil nor decent,” said Selja.

“The entire energy is being spent to subvert the electoral machinery to win elections at a time when lives of people should have been saved,” Bansal said, pointing to the incidents in West Bengal.

Senior leader Ajay Singh Yadav said that Congress functionaries across the state will soon actively engage in helping Covid-19 patients and also workers suffering due to the lockdown-like situation. “We will be helping people across the state as the party will form district-wise committees,” he said.