Integrity Score 2205
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By Pooja Chaudhuri
Prime Minister Narendra Modi addressed the nation on June 7, days after the Supreme Court termed the centre’s vaccine policy “arbitrary and irrational”. He reversed the vaccine decentralisation strategy and said that the centre will provide free vaccines to states from June 21.
PM Modi claimed that the centre had earlier been “pressured” to decentralise vaccine policy. “From January 16 till the end of April this year, India’s vaccination program ran mainly under the supervision of the central government. The country was moving in the direction of providing free vaccines to all. The citizens of the country too were maintaining discipline and getting vaccinated when it was their turn. Meanwhile, several state governments again said that the vaccine work should be de-centralized and left to the states…We thought that when the states are making this demand and they have enthusiasm, so let’s give 25 per cent of the work to them,” he said.
The Prime Minister attempted to evade the responsibility for a vaccine policy widely criticised by the opposition, the Supreme Court and the media.
BJP leaders have also been blaming the states for first demanding decentralisation then asking for centralisation of vaccine procurement.
(Link https://twitter.com/amitmalviya/status/1392835301278588931?s=19)
Prime Minister makes misleading claims in his speech
India has 28 states and eight union territories. Out of the eight UTs, Delhi and Puducherry have elected assemblies and Kashmir is under the President’s rule. BJP governs 12 of these directly and six others in coalition governments. For the Prime Minister to claim that the centre took the decision to decentralise on April 19 following requests made by states, the demand should have come from a majority of the states. But 18 assemblies have BJP in power or in coalition and the rest, barring two, did not demand decentralisation.
West Bengal CM Mamata Banerjee wrote a letter to PM Modi on February 24, requesting that the state be allowed to purchase vaccines for inoculation ahead of the assembly elections.
( Link https://twitter.com/Iam_Ayushmann/status/1364539270103404545?s=19)
Read the full story here :-
https://www.altnews.in/had-states-demanded-decentralized-vaccine-procurement-as-claimed-by-pm-modi/