Smriti Mandhana, Dinesh Karthik receive first dose of COVID-19 vaccine

Mumbai, May 11: Indian women's national team opener Smriti Mandhana and senior India wicketkeeper-batsman Dinesh Karthik on Tuesday (May 11) received their first dose of the COVID-19 vaccine. The cricketers posted pictures of themselves on their respective social media accounts while urging everyone to get inoculated.

Mandhana, who last featured in the home series against South Africa in March, posted a picture on her Instagram captioning it: "Please stay safe and get yourself #Vaccinated."

Karthik too took to his Twitter handle and captioned his image, "Vaccinated."

Earlier in the day, premier India seamer Jasprit Bumrah also received the COVID-19 jab. "Vaccinated. Please stay safe everyone," Bumrah tweeted. Bumrah is expected to lead the Indian pace attack in the upcoming World Test Championship final against New Zealand and the subsequent away series in England.

On May 6, senior India opener Shikhar Dhawan had received his first dose of the COVID-19 vaccine. Then several of his teammates, including skipper Virat Kohli, Cheteshwar Pujara, Ajinkya Rahane, Umesh Yadav and Ishant Sharma, had got their first jab in various vaccination centres across the country.

Head coach Ravi Shastri was the first from the Indian cricket team to receive the vaccine. He got his first jab in the first week of March when vaccination was made open for all senior citizens. In order to ramp up the coronavirus vaccination drive in the country, the Centre had last month announced a 'liberalised and accelerated' Phase 3 strategy of COVID-19 vaccination from May 1. As per the order, everyone above the age of 18 is eligible to get the COVID-19 vaccine.