NEW DELHI: The Congress Working Committee (CWC) on Thursday lashed out at the Centre for “unplanned” 21-day lockdown, causing trouble to thousands of workers across the country and implementing it without carrying out more tests. The CWC, at its first video-conferencing meet, said most state governments had complained of inadequate financial resources to fight Covid-19 as the Centre had not released state’s share in the GST. Addressing the meeting, Congress president Sonia Gandhi said the nationwide lockdown may have been necessary, but the unplanned manner in which it has been implemented has caused chaos and pain to millions of migrant workers across India.
Former party chief Rahul Gandhi criticised the Centre for alleged lack of assistance to the poor, especially migrant workers, and said no country in the world had attempted a lockdown with huge migrant labour without arranging for their stay and food. On containment and treatment, the CWC said the government had erred in adopting a strategy of limited testing.
On the mass exodus of migrant workers, the party said government has miserably failed to provide adequate livelihood support to the poor. “The Financial Action Plan I announced on March 25 was inadequate and left out several vulnerable sections of people,” the CWC said. It also demanded immediate announcement of Financial Action Plan II for support to farmers, landless agricultural workers, MGNREGA workers, laid-off industrial workers and Jan Dhan account holders .
Left questions PM Cares
The CPI(M) slammed the government over the creation of PM Cares fund for those affected by the corona outbreak, and questioned its requirement when there is Prime Minister’s National Relief Fund. “The motive for setting up this new fund remains suspect. In any case, it should have been named ‘India Cares’ and not ‘PM Cares’,” it said.