Our Bureau New Delhi
The statements issued by biggest vaccine maker of India, Adar Poonawalla (40) at London, have added to the insecurity among the Indian citizens at the times when people of this country are already suffering the worst due to COVID-19. The vaccine giant who has left the country has tweeted on his social media handles that everything is being left to his shoulders and he can’t handle it alone.
Not only this, he was quoted saying that he was receiving threats of dire consequences and therefore he don’t want to come back to India in this situation and spending an extended time in London. But hours after his statements put internet on fire, he was quoted announcing his return to India after meeting his partners in UK.
Poonawalla is the head of the world’s largest vaccine manufacturer Serum Institute of India (SII), has complained of receiving threats from politicians and “powerful men” demanding quick delivery of the COVID-19 vaccine that his firm has been producing.
He has given this interview to ‘The Times’.
Despite, he openly divulged the threats, his factory was said to have been gheraod by shiv sena on Sunday.
The videos were reportedly sent to India Today’s Rahul Kanwal by Poonawalla himself.
The social media was flooded with reactions from the citizens from various parts of the country. Google was showing 35,40,000 results in just 0.61 seconds on typing the name of Adar Poonawalla which included many news reports quoting him about threats.
This development has irked various media giants in the country also. Few were targeting the Maharashtra government while many others were questioning the Prime Minister for his involvement in Bengal elections and inefficiency to stop the religious congregation ‘Kumbh Mela’.
Bengal elections and ‘Kumbh Mela’ were termed as super-spreader for COVID-19. There were no reactions from the central leadership on this issue till the filling of this report.
Though, the Indian government has already provided a ‘Y’ category security to Poonawalla few days back. But this was not enough to stop him from fleeing the country.
Serum institute was producing 90% of the India’s COVID-19 vaccines. He said that he was receiving the calls from almost every powerful man from sectors of business, politics and bureaucracy and they were demanding supplies of Covishield – the Oxford/AstraZeneca COVID-19 vaccine that the Serum Institute is producing in India.
This development has further put the central government in a tight spot. Now, questions were being raised over the law and order situation in the country which is already reeling under the severe shortage of medicines, health infrastructures and oxygen at the time of this pandemic.
Hours after these threat statements had gone viral. The Poonawalla was quoted saying that he had meetings with his partners in UK and will soon return to India.
