A family wearing face mask as a precaution against the coronavirus travels on a motorcycle in Hyderabad (AP)

On criticism of the government over a sudden lockdown and mismanagement of the situation, Health Minister Dr Harsh Vardhan said, “If the lockdown was not used properly and things were not monitored, the dedicated 17,000 covid facilities would not have come up. Today there are 1,773 labs. There is a lab every three km in the country today. We have conducted 6.37 crore tests and only yesterday we have done 12 lakh tests. We have achieved our targets before time.”

He said the government started working from January 8 and advisories had been sent to all states by January 17. He said doctors and paramedics had to be trained while the pandemic was on and when reports of them being attacked came, the government brought in an ordinance to protect them.

During the debate, the Opposition came down heavily on the government for its “failure to adequately recognise the scale and complexity of the problem” and “the abrupt announcement of the lockdown”.

“Instead of mature and proactive governance, we have collectively witnessed a fundamental breakdown in government machinery these past few months, instead of clearly communicated protocols and comprehensive strategies, we have collective witnessed an alarming lack of clarity, readiness and preparedness to tackle the virus,” Congress MP Shashi Tharoor said.

Congress leader in the House Adhir Ranjan Chowdhury said, “No country has lost as many doctors or health workers as India. The government is not ready to accept that there is community transmission. If there was a well laid-out strategy, we would not see this day.”

Quoting from Thirukkural, DMK’s Dayanidhi Maran said the King should always have good advisers. “You should have stopped him.. But no one had the courage to tell him what he was doing was notright,” he said.