"PM Busy With Peacock," Says Rahul Gandhi, Abroad As Parliament Meets

Congress leader Rahul Gandhi, who has been constantly criticizing the government over its handling of the pandemic, this morning attacked Prime Minister Narendra Modi yet again as he said people of the country have to "save their own lives because PM is busy with peacock" amid sharp surge in coronavirus cases.

"India's coronavirus cases will cross 50 lakh this week and active cases will cross 10 lakh. Unplanned lockdown was the gift of one man's ego, which led to the spread of coronavirus across the country. Modi government said "be self-reliant (atmanirbhar)"... which meant "save your own lives" because the Prime Minister is busy with peacock," said the Congress MP, who will miss the first half of the monsoon session of parliament that started today.

Mr Gandhi left to go abroad last week with his mother and Congress chief Sonia Gandhi for her annual check-up.

In a single tweet, he attacked the Prime Minister over spike in Covid cases and accused the government of implementing the lockdown without a plan. He also referred to a video PM Modi shared last month on his official Instagram handle. The video, shared with a poem in Hindi, shows PM Modi spending time with peacocks at his Lok Kalyan Marg residence . The Prime Minister is seen in the clip feeding a peahen inside his residence and performing morning exercise in other visuals.

The Congress MP from Kerala has often said the government's unplanned coronavirus lockdown led to loss of lives and left lakhs jobless. 

Last month, he had tweeted that he was right about the Covid tally touching the 20 lakh-mark by August 10.

The government, however, has played down his criticism. Union minister Prakash Javadekar had earlier mocked him for his "daily" tweets. "Rahul Gandhi is tweeting on a daily basis. It seems the Congress will become a party of tweets as they are doing no work among the people and losing one leader after another. A frustrated and depressed party is trying to launch all sorts of attacks on the government," Mr Javadekar said.

India's coronavirus have cases passed the 48 lakh-mark with 92,071 new cases reported in the last 24 hours and 1,136 Covid-linked deaths, the government data showed this morning.