Rahul Gandhi on Thursday addressed a video conference on coronavirus saying he disagrees with Prime Minister Narendra Modi on a number of issues but now is not the time to fight, need to unite and defeat the virus. Mentioning that all the political parties need to come together to fight coronavirus, Rahul said his judgement on government's preparation on fighting coronavirus shouldn't be taken criticism but as advice or suggestions.
Speaking to reporters via video conferencing, Rahul Gandhi said that lockdown is not the only solution to defeat coronavirus but it's only a way to get some more time to get prepared to fight this disease. He suggested that the government needs to ramp up more testings, random testing and chase the virus. He said aggressive coronavirus testing is required if we want to defeat the virus as once the lockdown would get over, the virus will pop-up again.
The former Congress chief pitched for aggressively expanding coronavirus testing across the country and adopting it as a "strategic" instrument to "defeat" the pandemic. Gandhi also said the entire country has to fight the crisis "unitedly" and there is need to grant adequate resources to the states to help them deal with it in a "nuanced" manner.
Instead of conducting tests on the basis of suspected cases, India must adopt a strategy and bring out an architecture under which testing should be expanded exponentially and find out where the country stands, the Congress leader said.
"The lockdown is in no way a solution to COVID-19. It is like a pause button. We need to ramp up our medical infrastructure, testing facilities...We need to develop an architecture to deal with the crisis," Rahul said on coronavirus lockdown.
Gandhi insisted that there is a need for devolution of powers to states to help them effectively deal with the situation. He added that a "blunt instrument" should not be used and what is needed is a "nuanced" and strategic approach. He also said there is a need to use the available resources carefully.
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