Modi meets Poonawallas

"Had a good interaction with the team at Serum Institute of India (SII). They shared details about their progress so far on how they plan to further ramp up (Covid-19) vaccine manufacturing,” tweeted Prime Minister Narendra Modi after his November 28, 2020 visit to SII’s Poona facilities. The company’s chief executive officer (CEO) Adar Poonawalla tweeted in turn: "We share your vision and continue to work towards ensuring a safe and secure India.” The Prime Minister’s visit was the last leg of his three-city tour to vaccine manufacturers in the country. Earlier visits were to Ahmedabad’s Zydus Cadila and Hyderabad’s Bharat Biotech.
"We are amazed with what (Modi) already knew…He was impressed with the new facility that we have built…It can deal with more than one billion doses,” Poonawalla was quoted on ndtv.com on the day of the visit. Modi had visited the SII manufacturing facility in 2016 to see for himself what was being done to make life saving vaccines at the lowest possible prices (see "Keep going to Udvada,” Parsiana, December 21, 2016). SII is the world’s largest manufacturer of vaccines by volume.

From l: Dr Cyrus, Adar, Natasha, Cyrus Jr Poonawalla, Narendra Modi

The November visit was intended as a review of their Covid-19 vaccine development program, noted an announcement on SII’s website. Modi interacted with company’s founder Dr Cyrus Poonawalla, son Adar and "SII scientists and other executives who briefed him on the progress of the Covid-19 vaccine as well as discussed the vaccine implementation plan,” stated the note. SII has partnered with Oxford University and global pharma giant AstraZeneca, besides other manufacturers, for the development and marketing of the vaccine (see "Serum’s vaccine production,” Events and Personalities, Parsiana, June 21-July 6, 2020).
"After we get emergency use approval, we will make submissions for final rollout. After that the health ministry will roll out the doses in the first and second quarter ... But that is after we have made the submissions and everything is approved,” Adar stated. "As promised, before the end of 2020, (the company) has applied for emergency use authorization for the first made-in-India vaccine, Covishield,” the CEO tweeted, as reported on livemint.com of December 7.