Samajwadi Paty chief Akhilesh Yadav would rather risk the lives of thousands of people in the middle of a pandemic but not get vaccinated because the certificate has PM Narendra Modi’s picture, as asserted very strongly by him.
Akhilesh Yadav while speaking to the NDTV journalist, as he addressed a huge crowd at an election rally insisted that he will not take the Covid-19 vaccine unless the government removes Modi’s photograph and puts the picture of a national flag on the vaccine certificate.
For Akhilesh Yadav, public health is clearly less important than not seeing PM Modi’s photo on his certificate. That is why, despite being prompted by the NDTV journalist that he is setting the wrong precedence amongst the public by refusing to get vaccinated and moreover he is exposing himself as well as the other people’s lives at risk, the SP chief avouched to only take the vaccine if Modi’s picture is removed.
Claiming no democratic country’s vaccine certificate has the picture of a leader, Yadav reiterated that until PM Modi’s photo is not removed he will not take the vaccine.
Further, almost taking pride in the fact that he has not taken the Covid-19 vaccine yet, the SP chief said: “I’ve had Covid, studies say that if a person has gotten infected with the pathogen once, will not get it again soon”.
NDTV journalist Sreenivas Jain explained to Akhilesh Yadav how not getting vaccinated could put his life in danger, especially because he will be addressing and interacting with a large number of people in the run-up to the elections, but the SP president completely disregarded what is being presented to him.
When the journalist tried to explain how scientifically it has been proven that vaccination reduces the risk of getting re-infected as well as the severity of the ailment, the SP chief kept reiterating the same argument that those who have been vaccinated are still getting affected, so there is no need for him to take the vaccine.
The frivolous argument presented by the SP chief merely goes on to show how the opposition has made it their habit of nitpicking over trivial things, just to take on the Modi government. In January this year, Akhilesh Yadav stirred controversy when he dubbed the Covid-19 vaccine the “BJP vaccine” and declared that he would not get immunised. In June, the SP leader made a different argument, claiming that he would take the “Government of India” vaccine but not the “BJP vaccine.”
In fact, in the last few months, many Congress leaders have also created a widespread furore over it. Many have taken to social media to say that the Central government’s move reeks of obsessive self-projection and promotion. But, interestingly, as soon as the Centre left it on the states to bear the financial burden and the state governments are procuring their own vaccines, Congress-ruled states like Jharkhand and Chhattisgarh went on to quickly replace PM Modi’s picture with that of their own leaders.
