Prime Minister Narendra Modi arrived in Hyderabad to meet the officials of Bharat Biotech to take discuss details about Covid-19 co-vaccine.
While the Prime Minister arrived at Hakimpet airport, Chief Minister K Chandrasekhar Rao was conspicuously missing in action. In a snub, Chandrasekhar Rao was not invited to welcome the Prime Minister. The CMO has written to the PMO stating that Chandrasekhar Rao will be receiving the PM. However, the PMO replied back with a list of VIPs who will receive the PM. Shockingly, the CM’s name was missing from the VIPs list.
The list included Chief Secretary Somesh Kumar, Hakimpet Air Office Commandant, DGP M Mahender Reddy, Medchal-Malkajgiri collector Swetha Mohanty and Cyberabad police commissioner Sajjanar. As per protocols, if the PM visits any state usually the CM, state governor, union ministers, and top bureaucrats receive him.
But in this case, CM Chandrasekhar Rao and Governor Tamilsai Soundarajan were not included in the VIPs list.
Political observers say this is a deliberate move to keep the CM away from the limelight.
It may be recalled that KCR in a video-conference with the PM during the lockdown informed that pharma companies in Telangana were making aggressive attempts to produce a vaccine for coronavirus. He had told the PM that their Covid-19 vaccine could be produced from Hyderabad in July-August.
Clearly, the PM’s visit is a snub to the CM.
At Bharat Biotech, the PM reviewing the development of the coronavirus vaccine and the manufacturing process. During the day, Modi had visited pharma major Zydus Cadila’s plant in Gujarat. Zydus had recently announced the first phase of the clinical trial of its COVID-19 vaccine candidate, ZyCoV-D. “Visited the Zydus Biotech Park in Ahmedabad to know more about the indigenous DNA based vaccine being developed by Zydus Cadila. I compliment the team behind this effort for their work. The government of India is actively working with them to support them in this journey,” Modi tweeted.