Eternal pessimist and alleged journalist Ravish Kumar cannot stay idle for long. As a prisoner of his own habit, he ends up stirring controversies where sane individuals usually see the scope of finding none. In his most recent adventure, Ravish Kumar took to Facebook and subtly told Indians not to celebrate what by all estimates, was a stunning achievement for the country on Monday. On Monday, India administered a whopping 86.16 lakh Covid-19 vaccine doses. The record-breaking vaccination was carried out on the first day of the Modi government taking back the mantle of Covid-19 inoculation onto itself.
Up until now, the state governments had made a complete mess out of India’s vaccination campaign – after themselves demanding that the campaign be federalised. According to Ravish Kumar, however, India vaccinating a number of people larger than the combined population of 61 countries of the world is no big feat, and in fact, is rather an underperformance. In a complete submission before the Congress party, Ravish Kumar made it a point to somehow convey the message that the Narendra Modi-led BJP government is no match for the times when India was led by a parallel government from 10 Janpath.
Ravish Kumar made a brazen comparison. He said the vaccination figure achieved by India on Monday was no match for the polio vaccination campaign under the UPA regime. In his Facebook post, Ravish Kumar compared Monday’s achievement with the Pulse Polio vaccination program, in which 1.7 crore doses were administered in a single day in February 2012.
He said, “In February 2012, under Pulse Polio, two drops of polio medicine were administered to more than 170 million children in a day. Ten years later, the government exerts its full force with the help of Godi Media filled with propaganda and advertisements worth crores of rupees and administer only 85 lakh vaccines a day.” The eternal pessimist added that despite the government calling it the world’s biggest vaccination campaign, India has failed to touch one crore doses in a single day.
Ravish Kumar’s continuous point of contention seems to be that the Modi government has not been able to breach the target of 1.7 crore doses of polio vaccine administered in 2012 under the Congress-led UPA regime. Of course, this goal was set by Ravish Kumar in his own mind, and since India could not breach the said target, the alleged journalist set out to shame the country for falling short of the target.
Read more: Impressed by India’s impressive vaccination strategy, 20 countries will now adopt the CoWIN strategy
Interestingly, Ravish Kumar is comparing apples and oranges. Firstly, the polio vaccine was introduced to the world in 1955. Guess when India received its polio drop doses? India began its pulse polio immunisation campaign in 1995 – a whopping 40 years after the vaccine was first made available to the world. There on, for the figure of “1.7 crore” doses to be reached, India took another 14 years. Therefore, Ravish Kumar seems to have lost his mind – which is why he deems fit to compare India’s pulse polio immunisation programme with the ongoing Covid-19 vaccination campaign – powered by vaccines made in India.
Furthermore, polio vaccines were administered orally – which was much easier than the current process of intramuscular Covid-19 vaccinations being administered to adults. Comparatively, India launched the Covid-19 vaccine drive only in January this year, and within six months, has been able to reach the figure of 86.2 lakh daily vaccinations. This, despite the fact that the vaccines are not available in abundance. In the case of the pulse polio immunisation programme, there was no need for social distancing. Further, no Covid-like SOPs were needed to be followed back in the day. In addition to this, the pulse polio drops were meant to be administered only to children, and not the entire population of India.
Ravish Kumar would be well advised to stick to his subject of expertise – which is putting journalism to shame on a daily basis. The man should not overburden himself with issues he neither has the capacity nor interest to comprehend. By doing so, the alleged journalist will be able to not make a fool of himself on a regular basis.