BJP in meeting spree after 'missing in action' charge from Opposition

With concerns raised in various quarters on the spread of disease in rural areas and as BJP is perceived to have lagged behind in reaching people on the ground, its chief J P Nadda on Friday inaugurated 800 nationwide Covid-19 Help Centres of BJP Kisan Morcha.

Inaugurating the help centres that will function at community centres in rural parts, Nadda hailed the Morcha head Raj Kumar Saha for putting up Covid help desks to carry out relief works in rural areas under the party's 'Seva Hi Sangathan' and 'Mera booth Corona Mukt' campaigns.

Expressing the confidence that this will help the poor in the village in a big way in fighting Corona, Nadda chose the occasion to highlight the Modi government's achievements on the Covid-19 front, from vaccination to ensure making the country independent in production of PPE kits, face masks and sanitizer and ensure uninterrupted supply of medical equipments.

Nadda hit out at Congress for raising questions on the vaccine first and now raising a campaign for it.

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Opposition parties have repeatedly targeted the BJP for its alleged absence from the ground during the pandemic. Congress, which seems to have taken a visible early lead as an organisation in taking to people the relief work, has launched a campaign of "missing" governance, which the BJP has in the last one fortnight tried to counter aggressively.

"Our help desk has begun functioning at 658 centres and our Kisan Morcha workers are doing all to provide them treatment, oxygen and medicines," Nadda said, asking the Morcha to take up such programmes in future as well.

In the last one week, the BJP chief held over half a dozen meetings on Corona relief with over a dozen states. On May 22, Nadda talked to state Presidents and MPs of Maharashtra, Goa, Gujarat, Daman and Diu underlining the need to reach help to the needy through collective efforts.

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On May 21, he held deliberations with CMs and office bearers of Assam, Tripura, Arunachal and Manpur and asked them to spread awareness about the disease and reach all possible help. On May 20, he held deliberations with CMs and party office bearers from Uttar Pradesh, Uttarakhand, Haryana, Himachal Pradesh, Punjab, Chandigarh, Jammu and Kashmir and Ladakh.

On May 19, he had a meeting with the general secretary in -harge and state chief of Odisha, Delhi and Rajasthan in which he appealed to the BJP workers to provide food, ration and medicine to the needy. The same day he reviewed and discussed the Seva Sangathan campaign through video conferencing with Telangana, Karnataka and Andhra Pradesh's BJP MP's, state presidents, in-charges and co-incharges.

On May 18, Nadda spoke to CMs and leaders from Madhya Pradesh, Chhattisgarh, Bihar and Jharkhand and on May 16, he chaired a meeting with national office bearers where he asked them for reaching service to people with maintaining health protocol. The same day he also flagged off Covid relief material for Himachal Pradesh.

Inaugurating the help desks, Nadda accused the Opposition parties of making all attempts to derail the exercise and expressed confidence that everyone will be vaccinated very soon.

He particularly highlighted that all BJP-led NDA state governments have made the vaccination free for people to help the poor and attacked Sonia Gandhi without naming her saying "those who write letters should ask their chief ministers to do the same."