Union Minister Naqvi slams Cong on COVID mismanagement comment, questions their 'ideology'

Union Minister Mukhtar Abbas Naqvi slammed Congress neta Shashi Tharoor for his statement on the handling of the COVID-19 situation in India by the PM Modi-led NDA government at the Lahore Lit Fest and said that the Congress party was suffering from 'political inflation'. 

Shashi Tharoor claimed that the COVID-19 situation in India was still grave and that he was 'looking with envy' as India's neighbours returned to normalcy while the numbers continued to shoot up in India. Further, Shashi Tharoor claimed that Rahul Gandhi had warned the government about the outbreak of COVID-19 and the 'economic catastrophe' that would follow much earlier and that the government turned a deaf ear to it. 

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Taking on Shashi Tharoor and the Congress party, Minister for Minority Affairs Naqvi asked if Congress netas were astrologers who knew about COVID-19 before its outbreak, then why couldn't they predict the future of their own party. Naqvi claimed that the Congress party was on 'ventilator' but their 'stupidness was on the accelerator'. 

Defending the government, Union Minister Naqvi pointed out that PM Modi undertook a lot of efforts to tackle COVID-19 over the last few months and that India was trying to get over the pandemic. Naqvi took a dig at the Congress and said that 'there was no cure for their ideology'. 

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Active COVID-19 cases below 8 lakh for 2nd day in row

Maintaining a "steady declining trend", the number of active COVID-19 cases in India stayed below eight lakh for the second consecutive day on Sunday and comprised 10.45 per cent of the total caseload, the Union Health Ministry said. There are 7,83,311 active cases of coronavirus infection as on date. The total number of recoveries have surged to 65,97,209 and exceed active cases by 58,13,898. The COVID-19 recovery rate in the country has improved to 88.03 per cent, the ministry said.

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As many as 22 states and Union Territories, including Madhya Pradesh, Gujarat, Bihar, Jharkhand, Punjab, Arunachal Pradesh and Chandigarh, have less than 20,000 active cases. Also, 10 states and Union Territories, including Tamil Nadu, Andhra Pradesh, Uttar Pradesh, West Bengal, Assam, Chhattisgarh, Delhi, Telangana, Rajasthan and Odisha have over 20,000 but less than 50,000 active cases, while three states -- Maharashtra, Karnataka and Kerala have more than 50,000 active infections, the ministry said.

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