The Union Home Ministry in a letter to West Bengal government has revealed that the state has the highest rate of coronavirus fatalities. In a memo, the Union Home Ministry also pointed out that the state has a “very low rate of testing in proportion to the population and a very high rate of mortality of 13.2 percent, by far the highest for any state.”
The letter revealed further, “This is a reflection of poor surveillance, detection, and testing in the state. There is also a need to increase random testing in crowded clusters.”
In a letter to West Bengal Chief Secretary, Union Home ministry secretary Ajay Bhalla revealed that the lockdown violations are noted in the cities of Kolkata and Howrah with media reports of the corona warriors being attacked.
The home secretary stated that certain instances of overcrowding in markets with poor sanitation, free movement of people in large numbers without masks, bathing of people in rivers, people playing cricket and football, serious laxity in enforcing lockdown measures in containment zones, plying of rickshaws without any restriction are grave violations of lockdown instructions and social distancing norms have emerged in the state. They all are examples of poor implementation of crowd control measures by district authorities, the letter said.
After the feedback of IMCT teams which were deputed in Kolkata and Jalpaiguri districts since April 20 and returned on Monday, the Union Home secretary wrote the letter to West Bengal secretariat.
The IMCT had extensively toured a total of seven districts in the state and have communicated their observations from time to time to the state government, Bhalla mentioned in the letter.
The two-page letter said that the stricter enforcement of lockdown was necessary and that problem has arisen due to the ostracism of healthcare professionals and lack of quarantine facilities in the state.
IMCT slammed West Bengal government for its handling of coronavirus crisis
The Inter-Ministerial Central Team(IMCT) slammed the West Bengal government for its handling of the Wuhan Coronavirus crisis in its final observations regarding the state of affairs. Team Leader and Special Secretary to the Government of India, Apurva Chandra, in his letter to the Chief Secretary of the state asserted that the government had taken an antagonistic approach towards the team and has not supported it in its pursuit to carry out its duties. He also said that the testing rate was not up to the mark and indicated that the government led by Mamata Banerjee was fudging data, an accusation that has been leveled by numerous other people across the board. The letter also said that adequate systems were not in place to conduct surveillance in containment zones.
