Owing to the diverse conditions prevailing across the length and breadth of the country, the Supreme Court on Wednesday dismissed the lawyers' plea seeking permission for door-to-door COVID-19 vaccination for the disabled and people belonging to weaker sections of society.
According to the court, it cannot pass a general direction to just scrap the existing policy.
The apex court said the vaccination drive is already in already rolling full fledgedly and over 60 per cent of the population has been administered the first dose.
A bench of Justices D Y Chandrachud, Vikram Nath and Hima Kohli asked the petitioner ‘Youth Bar Association’ to approach the competent authority at the Health Ministry with its suggestions.
“In Ladakh the situation is different from Kerala. In Uttar Pradesh the situation is different from any other state. In Urban areas the situation is different from rural areas. There are different kinds of problems in every state in this vast country,” the bench said.
“With one brush you want an order for the entire country. The vaccination drive is already in progress and over 60 per cent of the population has been administered the first dose. One should understand the difficulty. This is a matter of governance; we cannot just scrap the existing policy,” it added.
The top court told advocate Baby Singh, appearing for the association that a petition cannot be filed in a callous manner.
The petition sought direction to the Union of India and all states for door to door COVID vaccination of less privileged, disabled, weaker sections of society as they face difficulty in registering themselves on the CoWIN portal.
The bench said, “The vaccination programme is already underway and this court is monitoring the situation in suo motu proceedings”.
It said that to pass general directions in view of the diversity of the country is not feasible and practical and added, “Any directions passed should not impinge upon the existing vaccination policy of the government”.
When the petitioner’s counsel said the Health Ministry should be asked to consider the representation in a time bound manner, the bench said, “we know under how much the pressure the health ministry officials are during these times, they have to look for Oxygen supplies across the country besides looking into other aspects."
(With PTI Inputs)
