Thiruvananthapuram, June 20(BPNS)
Swadeshi Jagaran Manch( SJM), the intellectual wing of the RSS has said that all patents be removed from the Covid -19 vaccine. The SJM Kerala state convenor, Ranjit Karthikeyan in a press release said that the webinar which was held from 9.30 am till 5.30 pm on Sunday claimed that this was the first time in the history of the internet activism that program of this duration was conducted.
Karthikeyan said that several countries including India and South Africa had demanded removal of Patent in the production of Covid vaccine and added that this was the time to act. He said that the webinar organized by the Kerala unit of the SJM had huge participation and had facilities for people to vent their opinion in the platform.
He said that the idea was to put pressure regarding providing the vaccine technical knowhow without any patent threads to all the countries irrespective of the status of whether they are poor, underdeveloped, or developing nations.
Ranjit Karthikeyan said that India and South Africa had in October 2020 petitioned the World Health Organisation that the Patent for the Covid-19 vaccine be removed and 57 countries in the world had pledged support. The SJM leader said that speakers in the webinar deliberated that the WHO could not take a concrete decision on removal of the patent due to the stiff resistance of the powerful lobby of Global vaccine manufacturing companies.
Kerala state convenor of the SJM said that the webinar is the first of several agitations and campaigns that the organization will be conducting in the days to come against the continuance of Covid -19 vaccine patent.
RSS leader S Sethumadhavan inaugurated the webinar.SJM National convenor, Sundaram Ramanujam, Former Indian ambassador to the United States and India’s Permanent representative in International Atomic Energy Agency(IAEA), Vienna, T.P Sreenivasan spoke during the webinar which was attended by a large number of people spread across continents.
SJM, Kerala leader, Sajeev C Nair proposed a vote of thanks.
