Vaccine a tool for PM's 'personal publicity': Cong

New Delhi: Congress leader Priyanka Gandhi Vadra on Wednesday held the Centre responsible for the vaccine crisis in the country and alleged that vaccines were a means for Prime Minister Narendra Modi's "personal publicity" rather than a tool to save people's lives.

This was so from the beginning of the pandemic, the Congress general secretary said in posts on Twitter and Facebook.

The central government is responsible for creating a vaccine crisis in the country when experts have repeatedly highlighted the importance of vaccination, she said in a statement later in the day.

"Today, the states are forced to take out a global tender for vaccines and they have been left disappointed by the companies, but the central government is not acting at all," she said. In her social media posts, Priyanka Gandhi alleged that the Modi government has pushed the country into a "swamp of vaccine shortage" and left India, the world's largest vaccine manufacturer, dependent on vaccine donations from other countries.

Accusing the Centre of shifting the onus of vaccination on to states, she said there is now only Prime Minister Modi's photo on the vaccination certificate while the rest of the responsibility has been put on the states.

"Today, the chief ministers of states are sending messages to the Central government over the lack of vaccines," she said in her post in Hindi.

Her sharp attack on the government on the issue came as part of her 'Zimmedaar Kaun?' (who is responsible) campaign, asking questions of the government on behalf of the people over its handling of the coronavirus pandemic.

On August 15 last year, the prime minister said in a speech from the Red Fort that his government has prepared an entire plan for vaccination, she posted. Given India's history of vaccine production and the vastness of its vaccine programmes, it was easy to believe that the government would do this work in a better way, Priyanka Gandhi added.

"After all, Pandit Jawaharlal Nehru gave flight to India's vaccine programme by setting up a vaccine unit in Chennai in 1948 and the National Institute of Virology, Pune, in 1952. We successfully defeated diseases like smallpox, polio etc. Later, India started exporting vaccines to the world and today it is the largest vaccine producer in the world," she noted.

Knowing these achievements, the country was sure that the people of India would not face problems in vaccination against COVID-19, Priyanka Gandhi said.

"But the bitter truth is that from the beginning of

the pandemic, vaccines in India became a tool for the prime minister's personal publicity rather than a tool to save the lives of the common people," the Congress leader alleged.

"As a result, India, the world's largest vaccine producer, has today become dependent on vaccine donations from other countries and has joined the ranks of the world's weakest countries in terms of vaccination."