Lakhs deprived of COVID-19 vaccines in Bengal due to TMC`s partisan policies: Suvendu Adhikari hits at Mamata Banerjee govt

BJP leader Suvendu Adhikari said, `The TMC government has procured only a few lakh vials so far and other states have done far better on this front. The ruling party wants to engage in politics over human lives, the lives of 10 crore people of West Bengal.`

New Delhi: Putting the onus on the West Bengal government for the pace of COVID-19 vaccination, BJP leader Suvendu Adhikari on Thursday (August 5) said that it is due to the Mamata Banerjee-led government's partisan policies which have deprived lakhs of the opportunity to get vaccinated. 

Further, he claimed at least nine lakh vials sent by the Centre were wasted in the state and now the TMC supremo is blaming the central government. “But, in a 360-degree turn, she has changed her stance and is now putting the entire blame on the central government for the tardy pace of inoculation in her state," he was quoted as saying by PTI. 

Addressing a meeting of health volunteers of the BJP, Adhikari claimed, "The TMC government has procured only a few lakh vials so far and other states have done far better on this front. The ruling party wants to engage in politics over human lives, the lives of 10 crore people of West Bengal.”

He also accused the state government of making the vaccine crisis worse by the “system of handing over tokens to people close to the TMC". The BJP MLA questioned, “What will happen to the lakhs of BJP supporters? Don't they have the right to be saved from COVID-19? Don't their parents have the right to lead a healthy life?" 

Adhikari, who left TMC to join BJP before West Bengal Assembly elections this year, asked the party's health volunteers to get COVID-19 jabs at vaccination facilities run by the Centre.

Adhikari’s attack on the state government comes the day when West Bengal CM Mamata Banerjee alleged Centre of favouring BJP ruled states while distributing COVID-19 vaccines and appealed to Prime Minister Narendra Modi not to "discriminate among states." 

Addressing the Global Advisory Board (GAB), Nobel laureate Abhijit Vinayak Banerjee slammed the Centre over vaccine shortage and said that the government is incapable of generating supply for the nation. 

Abhijit Banerjee claimed that the promised level of vaccine supplies has not been met. “The biggest problem is that Centre is not capable of generating supply of vaccines for the country. If there were enough vaccines, these claims wouldn't have arisen. We have not received the promised level of supply for the entire nation,” the economist was quoted as saying by ANI. 

(With agency inputs)