Narayan Murthy suggested to provide Covid-19 Vaccine to people free, Corona tax should be imposed on companies
Everyone is eagerly waiting for the vaccine to escape the coronavirus. Many big pharma companies around the world are working on the Corona vaccine and the results so far are also encouraging. But concerns have deepened from governments to the general public about the price and availability of the corona vaccine. Narayana Murthy, the co-founder of Infosys, India’s second-largest IT company, has said that when the Corona vaccine is available in the market, it should be made available to every citizen of the country for free, no money should be charged from anyone.
Infosys co-founder Narayana Murthy said that the government may impose a tax on the corporate world to buy the vaccine, but it should be provided free of cost to the common people. This statement of Narayana Murthy is considered to be very important during the Corona crisis.
During the recently concluded Bihar elections, BJP released its manifesto, under which Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman promised to provide Covid-19 vaccine free of cost to all. He also said that companies who can afford the cost of medicine should make the medicine free of cost and give it to the people and fulfill their social responsibility.
This statement of Narayana Murthy comes at a time when Moderna and Pfizer companies are about to introduce their two-dose medicines in the market. According to the statistics, the government will need about 3 billion doses to vaccinate the entire population of the country. But now in the fear of the second wave of corona in many states, the concerns of the state governments have increased.
Announcement of a grant of Rs 900 crore for research on Covid-19 vaccine
On November 12, Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman announced a grant of Rs 900 crore to the Department of Biotechnology for research on the Covid-19 vaccine. She said that the scope of the grant does not include the actual cost of the vaccine and the cost of distribution. A separate provision will be made for this when the vaccine is available. Sitharaman said that an additional budgetary allocation of Rs 10,200 crore will also be made for capital and industrial expenditure for domestic defense equipment, industrial incentives, infrastructure and green energy.