Modi announces vaccination festival between April 11 and 14 Conceding that India was in the grip of a serious public health crisis that had surpassed the first wave of the Covid-19 pandemic, Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Thursday urged state governments to test more even if that meant higher reporting of the infection. Armed with experience of managing the first wave, better health infrastructure and a locally manufactured vaccine, lockdowns should be avoided altogether, the PM told chief ministers at the virtual meet on Covid. “In the last phase of the infection, we had to impose lockdowns because at that time, we did not have the infrastructure to control the infection: no PPE suits, not enough sanitisers, masks… we are no longer facing those shortages. So micro-containment zones should be the strategy,” he said. Sounding a note of caution, the PM asked states to check the rise in cases on a war footing, while stressing that efforts must be strengthened in the next three to f...