E-Paper
'Tika Utsav a good thing but...': Mayawati gives a suggestion to Centre
Speaking to news agency ANI, the former Uttar Pradesh chief minister said, “The special campaign to celebrate the introduction of vaccines is a good thing. But it would have been more appropriate if this festival was celebrated by administering vaccine doses to the poor and needy free-of-cost.”
Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP) supremo Mayawati on Wednesday lauded the Centre’s move to organise the four-day-long ‘Tika Utsav’, a special vaccination drive that was launched on April 11 to ramp up the inoculation against the coronavirus disease (Covid-19). However, she suggested the campaign would have achieved its objective had the Centre vaccinated the poor for free.
Speaking to news agency ANI, the former Uttar Pradesh chief minister said, “The special campaign to celebrate the introduction of vaccines is a good thing. But it would have been more appropriate if this festival was celebrated by administering vaccine doses to the poor and needy free-of-cost.”
Mayawati has, on several occasions, urged the Centre and state governments to provide free vaccination to the underprivileged against the Covid-19 disease. “I appeal to the Centre and state governments to provide free vaccines to the poor. I appeal to everyone to take the vaccine,” she had told the news agency on March 13 after she received the first dose of the vaccine.
More than 2.5 million doses were administered on the third day of the 'Tika Utsav' on Tuesday, which took the total number of beneficiaries vaccinated against Covid-19 across India to 111,033,925, the Union health ministry said. As many as 67,893 Covid Vaccination Centres were operational on Wednesday.
Monday saw the highest numbers of beneficiaries (over 3.7 million) getting inoculated while 71,000 CVCs were operational. While on the first day of the 'Tika Utsav' on Sunday, nearly 3 million vaccine doses were administered and 63,000 CVCs were functional.
Also Read| 'Tika Utsav' ends today, over 25 lakh doses administered on day 3
At the launch of the ‘Tika Utsav’, Prime Minister Narendra pitched for zero vaccine wastage and stressed people to reach the optimum vaccination capacity of the country. “In these four days, we have to make every effort to achieve our goals at the individual, societal and administrative level,” Modi said in a blog addressed to citizens where he had also made suggestions on curbing the spread of Covid-19.
India, meanwhile, on Wednesday registered the highest single-day spike in its daily Covid-19 tally since the beginning of the pandemic with 184,372 fresh cases in the last 24 hours, according to the Union health ministry’s data.
More than 1,000 people died during the same period, the highest single-day casualty in over five months. The caseload has now climbed to 1,3873,825, including 172,085 deaths, 12,336,036 recoveries and 1,365,704 active cases.
