Vaccine Maitri : India's vaccine deplomacy

• The Corona Virus :
The irony of the pandemic is, the most powerful countries are the worst hit, the US, Britain, France, Brazil, India.....and the list goes on. However in the number of Covid19  cases and deaths across the Globe United States is leading the world with more than 2.8 million cases and some less then 500,000 thousand deaths( now we know why Trump was pissed off on China since the beginning). India however is 2nd in the list with nearly 10.1 million cases and some 155,764 deaths as of I'm writing the post. 
Countries like Brazil, France and Britain have either more or similar number of deaths compared to India, though India have several times more population, a bigger population density and greater number of infection cases, several researchers and academics however have questioned the numbers repored while some applauded the immune system of Indians. 

• The Race for vaccine :
The world has come a long way in fight against the COVID, since it's inception, the lockdown, trembling economies, a new variant of the virus, rat race for getting more number of masks, sanitizers and ventilators. Now this race have culminated to another level, The race for vaccine. The good news came from Russia which announced it's vaccine as Sputnik V, it was considered dubious on the line of efficiency and data related to it's development. In Britain, when oxford and AstraZeneca announced it's vaccine, the world was optimist and countries started reopening there markets to get there economies back on track. Soon India announced its own vaccine made by Bharat Biotec and ICMR, the Covaxin vaccine. And these 2 vaccines were manufactured by an Indian Company Siram Institute the biggest vaccine maker of the world, and this news came with no shock since India makes 70 percent of total vaccine of the world. 
Several undertrial vaccine of India are developed by, Ahemdabad based ZyCoV-D, Hyderabad based biologicalE, Bengluru based Mynvax, pune based mRNA. 
Several countries like China, Russia and US are also developing there own vaccines but the AstraZeneca vaccine has been approved and endorsed by the WHO for use and is being manufactured by Serum Institute of India, whose vaccines has been received at least onces by estimated 65% of the children in world, Yes it's huge. 

• India in the role of leader :
But India is not just leading in production in these life saving vaccines but also in supplying it. As soon as the vaccines were launched,  the Foreign Ministery lauched Vaccine Maitri campaign, meaning Vaccine friendship on 20th January 2021. India already have provided assistance to some 150 countries with Medical supplies. 

Reaffirming the values of Vasudhaiva Kutumbakam( world is family) India gifted 6.47 million doses and the immediate neighbors were biggest beneficiaries by India's "Neighbourhood first policy". India gave around 5.5 million doses of vaccines to the neighbourhood. Bhutan (1.5 lakh), Maldives (1 lakh), Nepal (10 lakh), Bangladesh (20 lakh), Myanmar (15 lakh), Seychelles (50,000), Sri Lanka (5 lakhs), Mauritius (1 lakh) Bahrain (1 lakh). 
Some 16.5 million doses were commercial supplies to, Brazil(2 million), Morocco(6 million), Bangladesh(5 million), Myanmar(2 million), Egypt(50,000), Algeria (50,000), South Africa(1million), Kuwait (200,000) and the UAE(200,000 doses).
Some non-neighbour beneficiaries were Barbadose(100,000 doses), Dominica(70,000 doses). Grants given to Dominica were enough to vaccinate it's half of the population and India has given Medical assistance of Rs 16 crore To the Latin American countries including all of CARICOM members. India has also pledged to donate 5.7 million doses to the carribean countries as humanitarian assistance. 
India will be giving about 15 million USD for GAVI, the vaccine alliance and had earlier given 10 million dollars of assistance in SAARC. But there is a pertinent question, will India give vaccines to it's western adversary Pakistan with whom all ties are suspended since 2019 balakot airstrikes. Well, Pakistan is seeking vaccine from China it's 'All weather friend', but will receive India made AstraZeneca vaccine CoviShield. 
One of the key reasons for demand of India made vaccines is the price at which it is being offered. While the Moderna vaccine is said to cost $30, Sputnik V is costs at $10 and Covidshield vaccine is of $6.

• Global remarks :

The Vaccine Maitri initiative has earned a global value and praise for India. US State Department said, "India's a true friend using its pharma to help the global community." WHO cheif, Mr Tedros Adhanom,  Twitted and thanked India for it's “ incessant support to global Covid19 needs”. Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro thanked India for supplying two million vaccine doses, tweeting a picture of Indian God Hanuman, depicting him as carrying vaccine from India to Brazil as Sanjivini Buti (a life saving medicine mentioned in Ramayana) 

Bolsonaro's tweet. 

Bangladesh PM Sheikh Hasina, Maldivian President Ibrahim Mohamed Solih, Nepali PM KP Sharma Oli have also hailed India. India’s global image and prestige received a big boost thanks to Vaccine Maitri. 
Dominican PM Roosevelt Skerrit said, he hadn’t imagined that the prayers of his country would be answered so swiftly. He thanked Indian PM on early and instant reach of vaccine to his country on such a short call. 
 
On contrary the Chinese communist party  mouthpeice Global times frustrated on tarnished image of China due to hiding information of the Corona virus, in  series of articles of the newspaper have not just questioned India’s capacity to produce enough number of vaccine, but by citing the accidental fire at the Serum Institute of India's campus in Pune, doubted the efficacy of Indian vaccines Covaxin. 
Many countries have rejected the Chinese vaccine sighting it's efficacy and doubts over the data of effectiveness. China is barely able to give vaccine to it's all weather friend Pakistan, and reports of forcing it's vaccine on Nepal is also circulating after Chinese foriegn minister visit to Kathmandu. 
A last originating question is, how is India able to give vaccines as gifts to other countries despite a big population of Indians left to vaccinate? The answer is very simple, since India got all the big vaccines manufactured on it's land, the domestic companies are giving priority to India while producing vaccines and all these gifts India is giving is of it's own share of vaccines which it has obtaining from domestic companies on urgent basis. 

It has now been more then a year since the inception of virus was 1st reported in China, however there is still some controversy regarding the outbreak of the virus, as of now the WHO have rejected the theory which was quite prevalent, that the virus originated from a lab of Wuhan in China. 

The virus that brought Indians on there foot  has to be defeated, and so India the vaccine factory of the world as of now has 2 vaccines to inoculate it's huge 1.3 billion population. First is AstraZeneca CoviShield developed in Britain but being produced in India and second is Covaxin developed and produced indigenously. The Indian government launched the vaccines with full lime light and media coverage and news papers filled with news of home made vaccines.

All this assistances, grants, gifts of vaccine are adding up to the soft power of India, though India is militarily, economically and by population a giant. The country of Gandhi, land of Buddha, a country which never attacked others in it's history of more then 10,000 years, the people are very peace loving, Taj Mahal, Yoga.....  And what not. All of this soft power that India had was laudable but not enough in 21st century. As several global experts are speculating, the world will not be same post pandemic, there will be a big change in world order and Asia will be the power centre for the world. The Indian PM Narendra Modi had already signalled in his several remarks, that India will be emerging as leader in the new post COVID world.