Pune Mayor eats his own words, now says got vaccine from state

Mumbai: Pune Mayor Murlidhar Mohol on Saturday was exposed after it was revealed that the vaccines available for the city were not directly supplied by the Centre but it was delivered from what the state had received. He cut a sorry figure and ultimately reiterated that Pune had received vaccines not from the Centre directly but from the state government.

Mohol hogged the headlines after he claimed the Centre has come to its rescue and supplied vaccines directly to Pune. He on Friday had claimed that the Centre had directly supplied 2.48 lakh doses to Pune. Thereafter, another one lakh doses were supplied on Saturday to Pune. However, Mohol had to eat his own words and announced that Pune received doses from the state government and not from the Centre.

Mohol and other BJP leaders were trolled since Friday after he made his claims in this regard. He later announced that Pune will get 3.5 lakh vaccine doses in the next three days. Mohol's statement surprised the Maha Vikas Aghadi partners who were stepping up attack against the Centre for short supply of vaccines compared to Gujarat, Uttar Pradesh, Jharkhand and other states despite higher number of Covid-19 cases.

Most of the vaccination centers in Pune remained closed on Saturday. Vaccination, which was halted due to short supply of vaccines, started at a slow pace on Saturday afternoon after one lakh doses were supplied to Pune.

After Mohol’s flip flop, the Union I&B Minister Prakash Javadekar came to the former’s rescue saying that the Centre will supply vaccine doses as per the state’s demand.