Coronavirus cases: Congress leader Rahul Gandhi all set to release white paper on COVID-19 today

New Delhi, June 22: Congress leader Rahul Gandhi will on Tuesday release a white paper on the novel coronavirus at 11am. This comes a day after Gandhi termed the Centre's decision of not paying an ex-gratia to kin of those who died of COVID-19 as "cruelty" and said that the compensation is just a small help for the people and the Modi government is unwilling to do that.

In a teet, Rahul Gandhi said, "It is impossible to evaluate life. The government's compensation is only a small help, but the Modi government is not ready to even do that. First the lack of treatment during the Covid-19 pandemic and then the false figures and on top of that the government's cruelty."

Earlier, Rahul Gandhi had alleged that the "positivity" claims of the government in regard to number of COVID-19 cases are a PR stunt to hide the actual number of coronavirus deaths.

"Priority of the central government -- social media, false image. Priority of the public -- record-breaking inflation, coronavirus vaccine. What type of 'achhe din' are these," Rahul Gandhi had asked in a tweet in Hindi.

"'Positivity' is a PR stunt to hide the actual number of coronavirus deaths the PM's actions have caused," he added.

The Congress had earlier accused the Centre of suppressing COVID-19 death numbers, with Gandhi saying that the numbers do not lie but the government does.

"Numbers don't lie... GOI (Government of India) does," Gandhi had said on Twitter while citing a New York Times's estimate of the number of coronavirus deaths in India.