Chief Minister of Kerala Pinarayi Vijayan took to Twitter to rip apart his Uttar Pradesh counterpart Yogi Adityanath and his claims over the state's 'inadequate' healthcare system.
Vijayan shared a snapshot of a news article by The Times Of India reporting that Kerala's Infant Mortality Rate is down to 10, whereas the national average stands at 34 and UP worse than that.
The CM also took potshots at UP's declining heathcare, quoting the same news to say, "Kindly correct yourself Shri Adityanath, Kerala's Infant Mortality Rate is 10. National average 34, Uttar Pradesh's 43."
Pointing at the issues in Yogi's state, the Kerala CM said he was 'hopeful that this break (BEAUTIFUL-HAPPY-PEACEFUL KERALA trip) would help you to get rejuvenated for facing various issues in UP.'
Yogi Adityanath who is in Kerala to join the 'jan Raksha' yatra protesting against the alleged killing of saffron workers in the state, had earlier said "Kerala must learn how to run hospitals from Uttar Pradesh.'
Yogi was responding to a tweet by the CPI(M) that read, "We invite UP CM Yogi to visit Kerala hospitals to learn how to run hospitals effectively." The tweet was a clear jibe at the number of children's deaths reported from state-run hospital Baba Raghav Das Medical College in Gorakhpur early this year.
Adityanath's response drew the ire of state leaders, with Kerala Finance Minister Thomas Isaac even suggesting that the BJP leader stay as a guest and visit hospitals and schools before making such remarks about the state which, he said, was far ahead in development parameters.
"The people of Uttar Pradesh will benefit out of this," he said in a statement.
"One thing is very clear. The national leaders of BJP have no knowledge about Kerala at all, except the lies being propagated by the state BJP leaders," he alleged.
"However, things are different here. Keralites are well aware of what is happening in Uttar Pradesh," he said.
In India, Uttar Pradesh has the distinction of being the state with the highest child mortality rate with 50 children dying for every 1,000 births, while in Kerala, the mortality rate was 12, he claimed.
As per the rural health statistics of 2015, in 15 years, when the population increased by 25 per cent, primary health centres decreased by eight per cent, he claimed.
Issac said that in Uttar Pradesh, 64 among 1,000 people die before the age of five and 35 within a month.
