Centre briefs floor leaders of political parties in Parliament on COVID-19 situation

The Centre gave a briefing to floor leaders of political parties in the two Houses of the Parliament on Tuesday evening to inform them of the trajectory of COVID-19 in the country and the public health response to the pandemic.

Leaders of BJD and Shiv Sena, who spoke to , expressed satisfaction with the meeting.

Prasanna Acharya of BJD said the meeting was "very fruitful".

"The Union Health Secretary gave us a half-an-hour presentation on COVID and what the government is doing. We were briefed about what steps are being taken. We were also briefed about the vaccination programme," he said.

Acharya said Prime Minister Narendra Modi addressed the leaders and told them that despite the size of the country's population, the vaccination drive was better than several other countries.

"The Prime Minister also said that we have to fight this pandemic with cooperation and coordination with states and the central government will extend all help to states," the BJD MP said.

He said the Prime Minister noted that there was no scope of complacency in the fight against COVID-19 and the governments will have to work with more alertness.

Shiv Sena MP Sanjay Raut told that the government gave them details about what it is doing to fight the pandemic.

"I can say that it was a satisfactory presentation of the Health Secretary," he said.

Sources said TMC leaders talked about "vaccine shortage" and gave a letter to the Prime Minister demanding more vaccines for West Bengal "because its a vast state and third wave of Covid -19 has set in."

Defence Minister Rajnath Singh, Home Minister Amit Shah, Health Minister Mansukh Mandaviya, Parliamentary Affair Minister Prahlad Joshi, Commerce and Industry Minister Piyush Goel and Minorities Affairs Minister MA Naqvi were present in the meeting.

The floor leaders of AIADMK, Shiv Sena, NCP, BJD, Tamil Mala Congress, Trinamool Congress, JD(S), TRS, YSRCP, LJP, BSP, JD-U, NDPP attended the meeting, sources said.

Rajya Sabha on Tuesday held a four-hour log discussion on COVID-19 in which 26 MPs participated. Health Minister Mansukh Mandaviya gave a reply to the debate.

( With inputs from ANI )

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