Union Minister Ravi Shankar Prasad on Monday made a "humble appeal" to Congress leader Rahul Gandhi, who has been targeting the Centre over its COVID vaccination policy, to get himself inoculated against the virus.
"The country does not know if Congress leader Rahul Gandhi has yet vaccinated himself or not. If you (Rahul Gandhi) have not got the Covid-19 vaccine yet, my humble appeal is that please get yourself vaccinated," Prasad said while speaking to reporters in Patna.
Last week, Congress said that party interim chief Sonia Gandhi has taken both doses of the COVID-19 vaccine. However, Rahul Gandhi could not take the jab as he contracted the infection in May.
Earlier in the day, Rahul termed the decision of not paying an ex-gratia to kin of those who died of COVID-19 as Central government's "cruelty" and said that the compensation is just a small help for the people and the Modi government is unwilling to do that.
"It is impossible to evaluate life. The government's compensation is only a small help, but the Modi government is not ready to even do that," the Congress leader tweeted in Hindi.
"First the lack of treatment during the COVID-19 pandemic and then the false figures and on top of that the government's cruelty," he added.
Meanwhile, Prasad visited a COVID-19 vaccination centre in Patna and informed that he will be visiting five such centres to meet the people who are getting vaccinated today.
"I will visit five vaccination centres and will meet people who are receiving vaccines. Over 1 crore people got vaccines in Bihar," said the Patna Sahib MP.
The vaccination drive comes as Prime Minister Narendra Modi had announced that the central government would take over the nationwide vaccination drive, and the Centre would procure 75 per cent of vaccines and give them to states for free distribution to all citizens above the age of 18."The Centre will also handle the 25 per cent vaccination that was with states till now under the liberalised plan announced earlier," he had said, adding that the government will provide free vaccines to states from June 21 (International Day of Yoga).
( With inputs from ANI )
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