The government of India initiated the registration for the next phase of the Covid-19 inoculation drive for those above 45 years of age today at 9.00 am on the Co-Win portal.

The government said in a statement that citizens will be able to register and book an appointment for vaccination, anytime and anywhere, using the COWIN 2.0 portal or through other IT applications such as Arogya Setu, etc.

Taking to Twitter, the Centre tweeted from its citizen engagement platform – MyGov: “With the beginning of Covid-19 Vaccination of the elderly, 45+ with comorbidities, we are all set to enter a decisive phase in our fight against COVID-19! If you are eligible for the vaccination, then register on Co-WIN 2.0 by visiting http://cowin.gov.in #LargestVaccineDrive.”

However, hours after the opening of the portal, Twitterati stormed the microblogging site with tweets mentioning the unavailability of the slots for the vaccine inoculation and the glitches they experienced while registration.

Indian columnist, Harlina Sodhi tweeted: “So big day in #India today. Managed to register parents on #CoWIN without a glitch. But no #Corona vaccination slots available anywhere for weeks.”

CEO of Crimson Education, Francis Joseph tweeted: “Registered my parents who are aged 80+, but totally house full for the next 3 weeks. That’s the least I could do.”

Expressing concerns about the working of the portal, Director Centre for Mental Health Law & Policy, Soumitra Pathare wrote: “India’s #Covid vaccination program is hostage to #CowinApp which doesn’t work. Any1 evangelizing abt technology ‘revolutionizing’ healthcare, point them to CoWin. India’s software power on display!! TG they weren’t around in 2000-14 or we wouldn’t be polio-free until now!”

Ex IAS officer, PV Ramesh also took to Twitter to show his disappointment with the CoWin portal. He wrote: “What a way to start the week! Spent 45 minutes trying to register on http://cowin.gov.in without success. Am I challenged or the portal is challenging? Either way, no output. Will try again later.”

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