SAD President Sukhbir Singh Badal asks Punjab govt to buy vaccine doses worth Rs 1,000 Cr

Photo courtesy: PTI

Chandigarh: Shiromani Akali Dal (SAD) President Sukhbir Singh Badal suggested that the state government should purchase vaccine doses worth Rs 1,000 crore to vaccinate the entire State in the next six months. He alleged that Punjab’s chief minister Capt Amarinder Singh and his ministers had gone into hiding during a period of crisis. 

The SAD President Badal was talking with the media after inaugurating the tenth COVID  Care centre at Khatunangal in the Amritsar district established by the SGPC. 

SAD’s Senior leader Bikram Singh Majithia, who was also there on the occasion, disclosed that besides the 25 bedded Covid Centre and creation of a separate Isolation ward for people who had been asked to isolate themselves, the party had also started Oxygen Sewa in the constituency with fifteen oxygen concentrators.  

Majithia informed that as many as 65 oxygen concentrators for the Covid Care centre and the Oxygen Sewa initiative had been donated by prominent citizens and NRIs including Dr Pushpant Singh Grewal of Patiala, Nikhil Kilachand of Dubai and Jay Sidhu and the Oxygen Sewa was being initiated with five concentrators each at Majithia, Kathunangal and Mattewal.  

Majithia said that the entire Sewa was being done by keeping politics aside. “We have even offered help to Congress leader Ashwani Sekhri from the neighbouring constituency of Batala”, he added. 

Speaking on the occasion, Badal said, “it appears there is no government on the ground. While chief ministers in other States have made arrangements for vaccines, the Congress government is banking solely on the meagre supply of the central government which has also dried up. The government should allocate Rs 1,000 crore for purchasing vaccine doses to vaccinate the entire state population in the next six months”. 

Badal said people had been left to their fate. “Residents of border areas are suffering the most due to lack of medical facilities”. He appealed to NGOs and social organizations to strengthen this movement further by ensuring more concentrators could be delivered to the people. 

SGPC president Bibi Jagir Kaur who was present at the occasion said while Vaccine Sewa had been initiated today, the Committee wanted to import Pfizer vaccine doses on a big scale from the United States.