Congress leader Rahul Gandhi on Thursday attacked the Centre over its statement that it had never spoken about inoculating everyone with a vaccine against Covid-19 and asked what does Prime Minister Narendra Modi stand by.

The Centre on Tuesday said there may not be a need to vaccinate the country's entire population against COVID-19 if a critical mass of people are given a shot to break the chain of virus transmission, and made it clear it had never spoken about inoculating everyone.

"PM -- Everyone will get vaccine. BJP in Bihar elections -- Everyone in Bihar will get free vaccine. Now, GOI -- Never said everyone will get vaccine. Exactly what does the PM stand by?" Gandhi said in a tweet.

Health Secretary Rajesh Bhushan had said at a media briefing that there may not be a need to vaccinate the country's entire population against COVID-19 if a critical mass of people is given a shot to break the chain of the virus transmission.

"I just want to make this clear that the government has never spoken about vaccinating the entire country. It's important that we discuss such scientific issues based on factual information only and then analyse it," Bhushan had said.