Is Thackeray Falsely Accusing Centre Over Low Vaccine Shots?

As Maharashtra is forced into a lockdown situation yet again, the leader of the Opposition Davendra Fadnavis has blamed the Maha Vikas Aghadi (MVA) government of playing politics over the provision of the Covid-19 vaccine. 

Earlier in the week, news spread like wildfire that Maharashtra was to be blamed for wasting the vaccine shots. 

State Health Minister Rajesh Tope refuted Union Minister Prakash Javadekar’s claim that the State of Maharashtra had actually ‘wasted’ more than 5 lakh doses.

At the arrival of the city airport, later, Mr. Fadnavis has made a media statement accusing the present Maharashtra government of taking no onus of the fact that there are no beds available in the hospitals, cases of infection are mounting by the day and that vaccines are not reaching people in time. 

He further added that instead of blaming the Centre of low vaccine dose supply, the MVA party and its leaders should ensure the city does not enter another lockdown, affecting economy and business severely. 

The former CM could be seen defending the Union Health Minister Harsh Vardhan as he said that of all the states, Maharashtra, Gujarat and Rajasthan have received over one crore vaccines. 

“Gujarat and Rajasthan have the same population. Vaccines are supplied not on the basis of population, but on the basis of states’ vaccination performance.  Maharashtra received 1.06 crore vaccines. The DGIPR is a tweet on April 06 mentioned 91 lakh vials were used, which means 15 lakh are still left.”

The South West Nagpur MLA seems to be accusing the government of spreading fake news about vaccine shortage. It seems as if the various centers have been deliberately been shut down.  There is also an allegation of supplying more vaccines to UP than Maharashtra.  On the flipside of the vaccine politics minority affairs minister and NCP spokesperson Nawab Malik has called Mr. Fadnavis’ allegations as ‘baseless’ stating that he is purposely harassing the MVA government. 

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Currently, Maharashtra has a surge in cases of infections.  MVA has already sought permission to produce vaccines in Haffkins. Later, it is said to have been denied. It is now confirmed that vaccination centres are gradually being closed down as stocks are getting exhausted. A population of 3.5crores people in state and, therefore, there is a need of almost 10 lakh vaccines on a daily basis. 

 Most critics believe the Centre is playing games with Maharashtra and not taking their situation seriously.