Stalin takes a dig at CM for extending lockdown

Chennai

Criticising the extension of lockdown, Stalin said the Chief Minister should utilise at least the fifth stage of lockdown to make sincere efforts to protect people, instead of exploiting it for his publicity, as he has been doing so far. “Instead, if the CM uses it to win squabbles within his party or unleashes Ministers to lampoon opposition parties, it would not help,” Stalin cautioned.

Picking holes in Chief Minister’s statement, Stalin said, “Going by the numbers given by the Chief Minister, about 4.47 lakh PCR kits should be available now, but he says only 1.76 lakh kits are available. Where are the remaining 2.71 lakh kits?”

“Were the testing or kit availability numbers wrong? Why is the AIADMK regime maintaining grave silence on district-wise break up of tests done and testing kit availability?” he wondered. Claiming that only 560 ventilators were procured during the lockdown period, while 804 people have tested positive in Chennai on Sunday alone, Stalin referred to the death count of Chennai (129) and asked why the regime was lethargic in procuring ventilators and creating ICU beds? Despite knowing that increasing the testing volume was the solution to control the virus spread, there was no mention of testing in the CM’s statement, he said.

“If you are protecting people from the spread of COVID-19, how did 22,333 people get infected in Tamil Nadu? Are the 500-1,000 people testing positive daily and an all-time high of 1,149 confirmed cases on Sunday were not in Tamil Nadu?” Stalin questioned, before suggesting that the Chief Minister, probably, could take comfort in Tamil Nadu doing better than Gujarat.

“He cannot do that because the former CM of Gujarat might be angered. If they (AIADMK regime) would see low death rate, instead of irreparable loss suffered by 173 families, then it means they are infected by power disease,” the DMK president remarked, adding that the people were paying a heavy price owing to the ego, inefficiency, incompetence and irresponsibility of one person.