RTI reveals: About 29 cr doses procured so far, out of Rs 35000 cr allocated for COVID vax only 4488 cr used

Although India has been facing an acute shortage of vaccine for the Coronavirus infection, resulting in untimely deaths and millions getting infected with the deadly virus – the Modi government till May 28, has only spent Rs 4,488 crore for the universal vaccination programme, the reply by the government to an RTI query has revealed.

While allocating Rs 35000 crore for the mass vaccination in the Union Budget 2021, Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman had said in February that “two more (vaccines) will be launched” to shield the country against the COVID-19 infection besides Serum Institute’s Covishield and Bharat Biotech’s Covaxin.

As per the information obtained through an RTI reply, the Union government has as of May 28, procured about 29 crore doses from both of the vaccine makers.

“The Union Budget 2021-22 has allocated Rs. 35000 crores for the vaccination. Out of which Rs 4,488 crore has been sanctioned to HLL to buy vaccines from the Serum Institute of India and Bharat Biotech International,” says the RTI reply. HLL is a Thiruvananthapuram, Kerala based public sector undertaking known for producing contraceptives, condoms and Ayurvedic products.

As per the RTI, the government has procured about 21 crore doses of Covishield from the Serum Institute and 7.5 crore doses of Covaxine from Bharat Biotech as on May 28.

The Ministry of Health and Family Welfare said in reply to the RTI application filed by Nagpur based activist Mohnish Jabalpure that the “process of procurement of COVID vaccines and vaccination is going on.”

The Union Ministry of Health & Family Welfare on Saturday has claimed that India achieved a significant landmark in its ongoing COVID-19 vaccination drive as the cumulative number of coronavirus vaccines administered reached the 20.86 crore mark on Friday.

As per the Ministry, as of Day-133 of the vaccination drive (May 28, 2021), a total of 28,07,411 vaccine doses were given out of which 25,99,754 beneficiaries were vaccinated for the first dose and 2,07,657 beneficiaries received a second dose of vaccine as per the provisional report till 7 pm.

However, critics of the government believe that data regarding vaccination is being manipulated. Congress leader Rahul Gandhi, on Friday said, “The nautanki and mismanagement by PM Modi is the reason behind the second wave of COVID. We manufacture vaccines but only 3% of India's population is fully vaccinated.”

Experts believe that despite tall claims made by BJP leaders and Union Ministers such as Prakash Javdekar, at current rate, India will not be able to cover more than 30% population by the end of 2021.