Mamata Banerjee bats for universal Covid-19 vaccine programme

Mamata Banerjee has earlier urged the Centre for free universal vaccination across the country.

West Bengal chief minister Mamata Banerjee on Saturday criticised the Centre over the Covid-19 vaccination programme and said there should be a universal inoculation programme for everyone throughout the country. " ₹30,000 crores is nothing for the central government... There should be a universal vaccine program for all throughout the country," Banerjee said in the state assembly.

Mamata Banerjee alleged that the Centre did not work in the last six month.

"Universal vaccination should have been the priority of the Centre, but it's spending ₹50,000 crore on new Parliament building, PM's residence, etc," Banerjee said.

Banerjee alleged that the Centre did not work in the last six months. "The Centre did not work in the last six months. Ministers came to Bengal every day to capture it," she added.

Banerjee-led Trinamool Congress (TMC) won 213 seats in the just concluded West Bengal Assembly elections. The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) garnered 77 seats in the 294-seat state assembly.

Banerjee has earlier urged the Centre for free universal vaccination across the country. "The Covid management is my priority. There is a shortage of vaccine supply. Approximately 65% of vaccines being produced in India were already sent overseas. Still, we are vaccinating 50,000 people a day," she added.

Banerjee had said that the Centre should provide the Covid-19 vaccine for free to every citizen. ""We have demanded 3 crore vaccine doses from the Centre. I feel the vaccine should be provided free to the 140-crore people of India. I request the Centre to sanction ₹30,000 crore for a vaccine program for all throughout the country. I believe ₹30,000 crore does not matter to the central government. If a portion of the money that they spent in the election was invested for Covid vaccine then the universal vaccination would have already been done," she added.

West Bengal on Friday registered its highest single-day spike of 19,216 Covid-19 cases, which pushed the tally to 9,54,282, the health department said. 112 more people succumbed to the infection, taking the total number of fatalities to 12,076, the department said in its bulletin.