As authorities rush to vaccinate citizens to create a protective guard against any new variants of coronavirus, Ahmedabad civic body goes a step ahead, incentivising vaccination with nothing but an iPhone!

In order to encourage citizens to take second dose of the Covid-19 vaccine, the Ahmedabad Municipal Corporation (AMC) on Tuesday announced a lucky draw for those taking second jab between December 1-7. The winner will be rewarded with an iPhone costing approximately ₹60,000, in its press statement AMC said.

Health official sources had informed that the pace of vaccination for second dose had slowed down as many people were taking it easy with the second dose and not turning up in large numbers as was the case for the first dose.

Since it was important to get fully-vaccinated for complete protection against Covid-19, the civic body thought of a novel idea to encourage people to get a jab and try their luck to own the high-end device.

However, this is not the first time the civic body is incentivising the vaccinations. In October, AMC had distributed over 18,000 pouches of 1-litre of edible oil to those taking the jab. This was done with the help of a local NGO. Also, AMC gave away some 25 mobile phones worth ₹10,000 to the lucky-draw winners.

In Ahmedabad city - an urban area with population of over 50 lakh — so far 78,74,817 doses have been administered that includes 47,72,290 first dose and 31,02,527 as second dose.

Ahmedabad city was one of the worst-hit during the Second wave of Covid-19 in the State. The daily positive cases count had crossed 5000 in the city overwhelming the hospital infrastructures.

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