I really don’t get this clamour for postponement/cancellation of the Central Vista project to fund vaccines. Do the people asking for it really think that lack of funds is what is preventing rapid expansion of vaccine procurement?

Vaccine procurement is held back ONLY because of lack of global production capacity, you geniuses. Has nothing to do with fund availability! Many countries, much richer than India (most of Europe for example) are unable to acquire enough vaccines for themselves, only because they are not available. Surely there is no Central Vista being built in Netherlands, right? So why are they not able to buy vaccines. Simply because they are not available!!!

Now, look at one more reality of India’s demographics…. India is one of the world’s most lopsided representative democracies.
US Population – 330mn
US Congress Size – 535 members
India Population – 1350mn
India Parliament Size – 543 members

4 times the population for almost the same number of representatives. This is both silly and inefficient. One of the big reasons why citizens find their MPs inaccessible is because there are simply too many people in a Lok Sabha constituency for the MP to serve.

India needs a rapid increase in the number of Parliamentarians it has. The same is expected to happen over the next 4 yrs. The existing houses of governance are all ancient and crumbling. Most of them are randomly dispersed all over Delhi, many of them in rented buildings which cost over 1000Cr each year.
The existing parliament building is in horrible condition. People are literally sitting in the corridors outside the central hall when joint sessions are happening on folding chairs. This is not how things are supposed to function. We need a parliament building at least twice, if not thrice in size.

The new parliament + the Central Visa project, which was deemed necessary in 2012 is finally underway now and will include a bigger parliament building and put all government offices together for efficiency and ease of access to citizens.

Construction is an economic multiplier. So every rupee spent on construction boosts aggregative consumption by almost 2.5 rupees. The 20kCr spent on the Central Vista will inject much needed fuel into the Steel, Cement, construction industry as well as pay for thousands of man hours of labour, all of which will only add value.

So, given both of the above, I really see no reason to stop / postpone it.

I completely understand people asking that the Centre pay for vaccination for all. And if people are willing to wait for it, by all means, centralise the vaccination effort. But this clamour for postponement / cancellation of the Central Vista project makes no sense!!!