A year back on this date, India had its first case of Coronavirus in Kerala when a student returning from Wuhan, China was tested positive for the virus. However, fast forward one year, and India has not only managed to flatten the curve but also started the ambitious drive of inoculating its population as well as distributing the indigenously developed vaccine to countries around the globe. China, which gifted the global pandemic to the world through its sheer negligence and collusion with the WHO, tried to play the role of ‘good samaritan’ by engaging in vaccine diplomacy to regain the old goodwill but it appears like India has beaten China here as well.
During a press briefing on January 28, Ministry of External Affairs’ spokesperson Anurag Srivastava informed that over 55 lakh doses of vaccines have been gifted to neighbours & extended neighbourhood since January 20.
“From Jan 20, we’ve gifted over 55 lakh doses of vaccines to our neighbours and extended neighborhood-1.5 lakh to Bhutan, 1 lakh to Maldives, Mauritius and Bahrain, 10 lakhs to Nepal, 20 lakhs to Bangladesh, 15 lakhs to Myanmar, 50,000 to Seychelles, 5 lakh to Sri Lanka on request. Over the next few days, we’ve planned to gift further quantities of 1 lakh doses to Oman, 5 lakh doses to CARICOM countries, 2 lakhs to Nicaragua and 2 lakh doses to Pacific Island states,” said Srivastava.
Read more: India will give 1 Crore vaccines free of cost to its immediate neighbours excluding Pakistan
Seeing India’s free and successful vaccine diplomacy, China tried to emulate the same. It is being reported that Beijing is planning to distribute 3 lakh COVID vaccines to Sri Lanka. While the efficacy of the Sinopharm vaccine is less than 70 percent and has more than 70 side effects, Beijing is hell-bent on unloading its miraculous vaccines on poor countries who are reluctantly accepting it.
However, it still needs to be seen if China will send the entire batch of vaccines on its own or compel the Sri Lankan authorities to send an airplane to accept the delivery. We are saying this because China had forced Pakistan to send its own aircraft to take the delivery of the COVID vaccines.
Reported by TFI, while telling Pakistan to pick up the 500,000 vaccine doses itself, Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi had told his Pakistani counterpart: “Send your aircraft and immediately airlift this drug.” These all will be doses of the vaccine manufactured by Chinese major Sinopharm – which has been a subject of global trepidation following botching up of efficacy and safety data relating to its vaccine candidates.
Beijing does not care if the world gets inoculated with the vaccine or not, all the Politburo of Xi Jinping cares about is minting fresh Yuans. Any friendship with China comes with strings attached, as Pakistan had to learn the hard way. With a population in excess of 220 million, and China only sending 500,000, Islamabad has a tricky road up ahead, if it wants to beat the deadly virus which is one-billionth in size to the humans.
China is scrambling around to get its vaccine diplomacy on track but in the meantime, India has raced miles ahead of it and is receiving genuine accolades from grateful countries around the globe.