‘Tughlaqi lockdown’: Rahul Gandhi taunts centre for COVID strategy

New Delhi: Former Congress president Rahul Gandhi on Friday slammed the Union government’s strategy in tackling the COVID-19 situation in the country.

In a tweet in Hindi, Gandhi wrote, “The Central government’s Covid-19 strategy – Stage 1- Impose a Tughlaqi lockdown, Stage 2- Ring bells, Stage 3- Sing praises to the Lord.”

Rahul Gandhi has been sharply critical of the government over its handling of the pandemic.

Earlier this week, Mr Gandhi took a dig at the government after it decided to fast-track emergency approval for Covid vaccines used in western nations and Japan.

“First they ignore you, then they laugh at you, then they fight you, then you win,” Mr Gandhi, who had earlier urged the government to fast-track more vaccines, tweeted after the development. Mr Gandhi had faced severe criticism by the ruling BJP for his demand.

In a letter addressed to PM, Gandhi had also criticised the Centre for the poor implementation of the vaccination programme by exporting the vaccines and thereby creating “vaccine starvation” in the country.

Earlier, in a meeting held with the Congress-led states, Congress chief Sonia Gandhi had also blamed the Centre for mismanagement of the situation in the country.

The country has been witnessing a sharp increase in Covid cases and reported 217,353 new infections in the last 24 hours while 1185 people have died.