We are providing free COVID vaccines to States, UTs: Centre tells Delhi HC

The Central Government on Wednesday informed the Delhi High Court that under the "National Vaccine Programme" (NVP), they are providing COVID vaccines to all states and union territories (UT) free of cost and states and UTs are also following the same and providing it free of cost to citizens.

The submission of Centre's counsel Anurag Ahluwalia came during the hearing of a plea seeking reduction of COVID vaccine price.

He also filed an affidavit in the court in this regard having all the detail.

After taking note of the submissions, the bench of Justice DN Patel and Justice Jyoti Singh decided to dispose of the matter.

The court said as the centre affidavit stated that it is providing vaccines to state, UT and citizens free of cost, we see no reason to continue to hear the matter.

The petitioner Rakesh, a social activist, through Advocates AK Dubey and Pawan Kumar, had approached the Delhi High Court sought a reduction of vaccine price.

The petition stated that Hyderabad-based Bharat Biotech has fixed the price of Covaxin to the state government at Rs 600 per dose while the same is priced for the private hospitals at Rs 1200 per dose.

Similarly, the Pune-based Serum Institute of India, the manufacturer of Covishield fixed the price at Rs 400 per dose for state government and Rs 600 per dose for private hospitals. The prices are higher in India than in foreign countries.

The Centre has sent free of cost consignment of anti-coronavirus vaccine about 361.94 lakh doses to countries such as Bangladesh, Myanmar, Nepal, Bhutan, Maldives, Mauritius, Seychelles, Sri Lanka, Bahrain, Oman, Afghanistan, Barbados, Dominica etc. as per the information of Ministry of External Affairs (MEA) of Indian Government. But it is very surprising that the Union of India without securing our citizens has been helping out the citizen of other countries, which is good but the same cannot be done while our citizens are losing their lives, stated the plea.

The plea also stated that many people have been retrenched from their job/service by their company as the companies were not comfortable to run their business and a big population has not been granted the salary and if the salary has been granted then same was less than their previous salary, which they were receiving before the pandemic. The pandemic has also hit rural India and it has recorded its lowest economic growth in the last 10 years, read the plea.

( With inputs from ANI )