Kharge offers PM six suggestions on Covid

Congress leader Mallikarjun Kharge on Sunday wrote a letter to Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Rajya Sabha Chairman M Venkaiah Naidu, offering six suggestions to tackle the coronavirus disease (Covid-19).

In one of the suggestions, Kharge, the leader of the opposition in Rajya Sabha, asked PM Modi to convene an all-party meeting and virtual meetings of the standing committees of Parliament.

“Use ₹35,000 crore allocated in Union Budget to ensure free vaccine for all. Leverage compulsory licensing to increase production of vaccines,” Kharge said in his letter.

He further suggested to expand the scope of Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (MNREGA) to 200 days.

“Expedite the distribution of relief material and proactively disclose where it is shipped and leverage our collective strengths by governing consensually and inclusively,” the Congress leader said in his letter to the Prime Minister.

The letter comes a day before the Congress Working

Committee (CWC) holds a meeting to review the party’s performance in the recently concluded assembly elections. News agency ANI reported that the prevailing Covid-19 situation will also be discussed in the meeting.

India recorded more than four lakh cases in a 24-hour span for the fourth consecutive day on Sunday. According to Union health ministry, 4,03,738 new Covid-19 cases were recorded in the said period, which took the nationwide tally to 2,22,96,414.

The death toll climbed to 2,42,362 with 4,092 daily deaths, the data on Sunday morning showed.

Registering a steady increase, the active cases have increased to 37,36,648, comprising 16.76 per cent of the total infections, while the national Covid-19 recovery rate was recorded at 82.15 per cent.

India’s Covid-19 tally had crossed the 20-lakh mark on August 7, 30 lakh on August 23, 40 lakh on September 5 and 50 lakh on September 16.

It went past 60 lakh on September 28, 70 lakh on October 11, crossed 80 lakh on October 29, 90 lakh on November 20 and surpassed the 1-crore mark on December 19.