PM Modi spoke to eight Chief Ministers amid a spurt in Covid cases in their states.
New Delhi:
At a meeting with Chief Ministers on the coronavirus crisis, Prime Minister Narendra Modi today stopped Manohar Lal Khattar, the Chief Minister of Haryana, mid-speech and asked him to talk about his plan to tackle Covid instead of laying out figures.
The PM spoke to eight Chief Ministers via video conference amid a spurt in Covid cases in these states.
Haryana has seen an average daily rise of 2,000, the Chief Minister said.
As he was speaking about contact tracing, the Prime Minister cut in and said: “Manohar ji, we have the figures before us. Tell us your views about how you plan to control the spread of corona.”
PM Modi later urged Chief Ministers to share their feedback in writing on their COVID-19 strategy and said no one could impose any view, that all have to work together.
Mr Khattar told reporters after the meeting that Haryana was witnessing the third wave of COVID-19 cases.
“We were asked to prepare a list of who will be provided the vaccine first. The vaccine will be given as per category – health workers will be given first preference and then we will provide it to other categories,” said the Chief Minister, adding that the criteria of categories was yet to be decided.
One crore masks would be distributed in the state, said the Chief Minister, announcing restrictions on gatherings in districts near Delhi, including Gurgaon and Faridabad.
Others in the PM’s meet were Maharashtra Chief Minister Uddhav Thackeray, West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee, Gujarat Chief Minister Vijay Rupani, Rajasthan’s Ashok Gehlot, Chhattisgarh’s Bhupesh Baghel, Kerala’s Pinarayi Vijayan, and Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal.
India’s coronavirus tally is nearing 92 lakh with 37,975 fresh infections reported today. There have been 1,34,218 Covid-related deaths so far and 86,04,955 have recovered.
Before the meeting, PM Modi had issued directions for an action plan for speedy clearances and procurement to facilitate early rollout of a vaccination drive.
