Congress leader Rahul Gandhi on Tuesday hit out the Bharatiya Janata Party over the coronavirus crisis in Gujarat, citing a media report claiming that the state has the highest mortality rate in India.

“Covid-19 mortality rate: Gujarat: 6.25%, Maharashtra: 3.73%, Rajasthan: 2.32%, Punjab: 2.17%, Puducherry: 1.98%, Jharkhand: 0.5%, Chhattisgarh: 0.35%,” Rahul Gandhi tweeted along with a BBC report that talks about Gujarat’s weak health infrastructure and low testing figures. “Gujarat model exposed.”

On Monday, the Ministry of Health and Family Welfare had said that India’s coronavirus death rate was 2.8% while the recovery rate was 51.08%.

Gandhi has been fiercely critical of the Centre’s measures to combat the coronavirus. On Monday, he quoted physicist Albert Einstein to criticise the government over its implementation of the nationwide lockdown, saying that the “only thing more dangerous than ignorance is arrogance”. Last week, he had shared some graphs showing an increase in coronavirus cases during the four phases of the lockdown. The visuals appeared to show that the curve of infections in India had not flattened. “Insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results,” Gandhi had tweeted with the graphs.

Gujarat, Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s native state, has been repeatedly hailed by the BJP as a model for other states in the country.

With more than 24,000 coronavirus cases and 1,505 deaths, Gujarat is India’s fourth worst-hit state after Maharashtra, Tamil Nadu and Delhi. Ahmedabad alone has reported close to 17,000 cases and 1,210 deaths.

Even as the cases in Gujarat continue to rise, Gujarat Chief Minister Vijay Rupani had on Monday said that there were no plans to implement a lockdown in the state again, according to PTI.

The number of coronavirus cases in India rose to 3,43,091 on Tuesday and toll reached 9,900, according to the Union health ministry. India is now the world’s fourth worst coronavirus-affected nations. Amid the spurt in cases, Prime Minister Narendra Modi will speak to the chief ministers of 21 states and union territories including Punjab, Assam, Kerala and Jharkhand on Tuesday. Wednesday, June 17, will be reserved for talks with 15 most-affected states in the country.


Follow today’s live updates on the coronavirus pandemic here