NEW DELHI: High-profile Indian opposition politician Rahul Gandhi hasaccused Prime Minister Narendra Modi of telling people to “save themselves”while failing to tackle the Covid-19 outbreak.
“India’s coronavirus cases will cross [five million] this week and activecases will cross [one million],” the lawmaker from the opposition IndianNational Congress party wrote on Twitter.
“The Modi government said ‘be self-reliant,’ which meant ‘save your ownlives’ because the prime minister is busy with peacocks,” Gandhi added.
He was referring to a video that Modi shared on social media last month, inwhich he was sitting and walking with peacocks, as well as feeding thebirds at his residence.
Gandhi was been a vocal critic of the government’s response to coronavirussince the start of the outbreak. Officials have pushed back against hisattacks in the past, with Information Minister Prakash Javadekar saying inJuly that “the Congress will become a party of tweets as they are doing nowork among the people.”
India imposed a nationwide lockdown on March 25 and has since beengradually easing the quarantine restrictions. Meanwhile, the infectioncontinued to spread as 92,701 new Covid-19 cases were reported on Monday,with 1,136 more deaths.
‘Instead of ending Covid-19, he ended the jobs’: Indian opposition figureRahul Gandhi slams PM Modi for epidemic response
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Overall, India has had 4.8 million cases since the start of the outbreak,according to government data. Almost 80,000 people have died.
Despite the sharp criticism from the opposition, around 75 percent trustModi with handling the outbreak, according to the latest poll by newsagency IANS.
In May, Modi rolled out a stimulus package dubbed the ‘Self-Reliant IndiaScheme,’ which is aimed at aiding and boosting the economy during theCovid-19 crisis.
Courtesy: (RT)
