Punjab CM Amarinder Singh asks Congress to aggressively counter AAP's 'negative Covid-19 campaign'

The Chief Minister said AAP was spreading senseless fear in the minds of the villagers, thus deterring them from getting themselves tested for coronavirus and endangering their lives.

He also said his government would seek advice from the union government about the web channels that had mushroomed recently and were actively involved in spreading misinformation about the pandemic. Action will be taken against them, he added.

The Chief Minister was presiding over a high-level virtual meeting attended by several cabinet ministers and MLAs representing some of the constituencies where Gram Panchayats had purportedly passed resolutions against the state government’s Covid management programme. He will be holding more rounds of similar meetings next week.

Amarinder said AAP had been promoting `no testing’ and an activist of their party had also been arrested for spreading false information on Covid testing/treatment. LIP leader Simrajit Singh Bains had also joined in creating an atmosphere of fear among the people by himself refusing to be tested and calling for no testing and no masks, he said.

Terming AAP’s announcement of distributing Oxymeters a political stunt, he said Oxymeters had no connection with testing, and delay in the latter was the main reason for the state’s growing fatality rate. Given the pathetic Covid situation in Delhi, where AAP was in power, their pretension of being concerned about the people of Punjab was ridiculous, he said.