The newly elected West Bengal government, under the leadership of third-time Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee, has decided to use 2,75,000 quack doctors as the first line of defence against the second wave of Covid-19, as per a report in Hindustan Times. As per official stats, the number of cases has risen by 5-8 times in rural regions of Bengal compared to last year’s peak. Reports suggest that the state health department will soon issue a dos and don’ts list for the quacks to handle Covid-19 patients.
Hindustan Times quoted a senior health official of West Bengal, saying, “Even when the state was witnessing the peak of the first wave in October 2020, the cases in rural Bengal were under control. But now, cases have shot up almost 5 – 8 times in the districts with more than 50% rural population.”
During the first surge, West Bengal reported 4,157 cases in a single day on October 22, 2020. During the second wave of Covid-19, the state has already reported over 18,000 cases in a single day. Based on the data of rural districts including Birbhum, Murshidabad, Hooghly and Nadia, the cases on October 22 were 82, 110, 225 and 194, respectively. On the other hand, these regions reported 722, 500, 986 and 869 cases, respectively, noting around 5-8 times more cases.
Quack doctors have ‘helped’ West Bengal during last wave
The official further added that the state had been utilizing ASHA workers to fight against Covid. But now, they are planning to use quack doctors as they are available in almost all villages. “It is a huge workforce which we want to rope in because villagers visit them regularly for treatment. The state health department is coming up with a guideline in the form of dos and don’ts for this purpose,” he added.
If needed, these doctors can be given crash course training by the block and sub-divisional hospitals on handling Covid-19 patients and what steps to take if they come across a critical patient. It has to be noted that this is not the first time West Bengal is using quack doctors to fight Covid-19. During the first wave, the quack doctors reportedly ‘helped’ in keeping the infection at bay.
According to a report published in BBC in July 2020, over 100,000 such doctors helped the West Bengal government control the disease. The report suggested that since 2008, a Kolkata-based organization has been providing training to such ‘doctors’ and now the West Bengal government also provide such training at over 30 centres.
Who are quack doctors?
Often known as informal healthcare providers, quacks are basically those unregistered or unqualified health practitioners who do not have formal training in medicine. While some quacks treat the ailment with the help of home remedies, others use the knowledge they have gained after working with a registered qualified doctor over the years. These are similar to “non-physician clinicians” in Africa.
Covid-19 in West Bengal
The first phase of assembly elections was held on March 27 in the state. At that time, the state was reporting under 1,000 cases per day. However, as time passed by and the state was done with the eight phases of the assembly elections, the state was reporting over 17,000 cases per day. Based on the latest stats provided by the Ministry of Health and Family Welfare, West Bengal has reported 18,102 cases on May 5. There are 1,21,872 active cases in the state. 103 people have lost their lives between May 4 and May 5 due to complications associated with Covid-19.
Another youth has become the victim of ongoing attacks by TMC workers against opposition party workers in West Bengal. 22-years-old RSS worker Balaram Majhi, who was mercilessly beaten by TMC goons on Tuesday, succumbed to injuries later in that day.
Balaram Majhi, 22, of Ketugram(East Burdwan)who was mercilessly assaulted yesterday by the TMC perpetrators, succumbed to the injuries today.#PoliticalTerrorism of TMC pic.twitter.com/mAere0udBS
According to sources, TMC workers had attacked Majhi on Tuesday night at his residence in Sripur village in the Ketugram Tehsik in East Bardhaman district. Apart from beating him badly, his house was also vandalised by the allegedly Muslim goons. Balaram Majhi tried to escape from the attack, but he was nabbed by the attackers. He was pinned to the ground and beaten badly, and he was left by the attackers in a very serious condition.
After the attack Majhi was admitted at the local hospital, but as his condition was serious, he was shifted to a nursing home in Bardhaman town. But he could not be saved and he died later in the night.
Balaram Majhi was an active Swayamsevak of the RSS and was involved in the various activities of the organisation in the area.
Following the news of the death, situation became tense in the Ketugram area. A large police force has been deployed in the areas to prevent any untoward incident.
Balaram Majhi is the latest in the list of victims of the post-poll violence by TMC workers after the party won the assembly elections in West Bengal for the third consecutive time. Several other BJP and RSS workers including Shobha Rani Mandal, Uttam Ghosh, Avijit Sarkar, Horom Adhikari, Momik Maitra, Gaurav Sarkar, Arup Ruidas and others have lost their lives in the attacks.
As a result of such attacks, thousands of BJP workers have fled their homes along with their family members, and have taken shelter in neighbouring states like Assam.
On Wednesday, Germany announced that it was banning the Islamist organization Ansaar International, for financing terrorism worldwide through its donations. A German government spokesman said that “The network finances terrorism worldwide with donations,” and quoted Germany’s Interior Minister saying, “If you want to fight terror, you have to dry up its sources of money.” The banned organization had also solicited donations in the name of post-CAA riots.
Bundesinnenminister #Seehofer hat die Vereinigungen „Ansaar International e.V.“ und seine Teilorganisationen verboten. Das Netzwerk finanziert mit Spenden weltweit den Terrorismus. BM #Seehofer: „Wer den Terror bekämpfen will, muss seine Geldquellen austrocknen“.
The Germany-based Islamist organization is accused of sending funds to multiple terrorist groups abroad including the Al-Nusra Front in Syria, the Palestinian Hamas (which is on an E.U. terrorism blacklist), and Al-Shabab in Somalia. Interestingly, The banned organization had also solicited donations in the name of the Delhi anti-Hindu riots. On their website, they had mentioned that they were soliciting funds for Muslims of India after these riots and had also admitted that they were providing local help to Muslims.
The German Interior Ministry has claimed that some of the money donated to Ansaar International also went to projects that can be counted as “directly within the sphere of activity of one or another of these terrorist organizations.” This claim means that it is certainly possible that any donations Ansaar International collected in the name of anti-Hindu Delhi Riots could have gone to fund international terrorism.
Raids against Ansaar International were conducted all across Germany on Wednesday morning, in ten different states to be exact.
Ansaar International’s website says that its humanitarian projects help “people in need at home and abroad,” with projects in Lebanon, Sudan, and the Palestinian territories advertised. The Islamist organization has also distributed some relief materials to Indian Muslims affected by the anti-Hindu Delhi riots, with the materials carrying the tagline, “Wake Up Ummah!”
Image obtained from the Ansaar International website
German authorities had carried out a major raid on the Ansaar network two years ago in April 2019 during which extensive materials were seized, prompting a series of investigations that have now resulted in Ansaar International being declared unlawful.
According to the German Interior Minister, Ansaar International “spread a Salafist world view and finance terror around the world under the guise of humanitarian aid.”
Germany’s domestic intelligence said in the 2020 annual report that the country’s number of Salafists had increased to an all-time high of 12,150 in 2019, listing them being “Islamist extremists.”
According to the report, the number of Salafists had more than tripled since 2011 and the Salafist scene in Germany was going through a “consolidation stage,” with followers keeping a low public profile.
This is also a lesson for India and its intelligence/security apparatus to be more vigilant of foreign organizations or other assorted NGOs who don the cloak of humanitarianism but are instead funding terrorist groups worldwide.
In a shocking visual shared by the Executive Editor of India Today Shiv Aroor, large crowds can be seen flocking the markets at Charminar, old Hyderabad, flouting every single COVID-19 protocol.
It is not just social distancing that has gone for a complete toss, many can be seen roaming with no masks in the video dated May 05, 2021. The video has now gone viral on social media.
Currently, the business hours in the market extend up to 8:30 pm after which the city goes into a lockdown.
Telangana High Court slams the state government
The Telangana High Court on Wednesday ordered the state government to impose additional restrictive measures to flatten the curve in the state. The Court observed that stricter measures will have to be taken besides extending the night curfew and imposing a weekend lockdown.
Pulling up the state for intentionally reducing tests in the state, the division bench of the High Court comprising Chief Justice Hima Kohli and Justice B. Vijaysen Reddy slammed the government saying, “Our instructions to the government for the last several weeks to show some heed and to increase Covid testing have been like water off a duck’s back. The government is continuously reducing testing since the last week from 92,000 to 70,000. This automatically shows a decrease in the number of infected persons. By that, you are saying there is a fall in Covid cases. This is not correct.”
Ordering the state to conduct one lakh COVID tests per day, the bench remarked, “Testing at private centres is static but is decreasing at government centres.”
Director of Public Health Dr G Srinivasa Rao cited not enough people coming to the 1,100 testing centres across the state for getting tested as the reason for less testing numbers.
The court also instructed the government to limit gathering, however, it can be seen in the video that the orders have not been taken seriously.
Observing the violations of COVID protocols and spiritual gatherings at Nampally, Afzalgunj, Madina and Charminar, the court reiterated the need to keep a check on crowds. The police have been ordered to step in to control the gatherings and congregations by implementing stricter rules.
Second wave of the pandemic
This comes amidst the second wave of the coronavirus pandemic which has left the nation struggling with 3-4 lakh new COVID-19 cases being clocked every day.
Moreover, after the detection of the N400K variant of the novel coronavirus which was said to be 15 times more infectious and dominated cases till February, the states of Andhra Pradesh and Telangana are also battling the double mutant.
The double mutant which wreaked havoc in Maharashtra since a little over a month has now tightened its grip around the Southern states of India.
Telangana reported over 6000 new coronavirus cases and recorded 52 deaths in the past 24 hours.
Preparations for Eid in Kolkata
The Calcutta Khilafat Committee (CKC) in Kolkata, which is responsible for arranging Eid-ul-Fitr Namaz in the city every year, is awaiting the state government’s nod for conducting the same on Red Road this year. The occasion records a gathering of over two lakh every year.
The Red Road gathering is said to be the biggest congregation in the nation to offer special prayers on the occasion of Eid-ul- Fitr.
Following Trinamool Congress’s (TMC) victory in West Bengal Assembly polls on Sunday, there have been reports of widespread violence in West Bengal. Many BJP offices and workers have been targeted reportedly by TMC workers. In another such incident, Union Minister of State for External Affairs & Parliamentary Affairs V Muraleedharan’s convoy was attacked by TMC goons on Thursday afternoon. The incident took place in the Panchkhudi area of West Midnapore.
The Union Minister of State was on his way to meet the families of BJP karyakartas and supporters who lost their lives in the incidents of violence unleashed by TMC goons post the Assembly elections results being announced.
The Minister shared a video of the alleged attack on his official Twitter account. He informed that his car’s window panes were broken and his personal staff was attacked by the TMC goons. The Minister said that owing to the attack, his trip to West Midnapore had to be cut short.
“TMC goons attacked my convoy in West Midnapore, broken windows, attacked personal staff. Cutting short my trip,” Muraleedharan tweeted.
The video shared by Muraleedharan showed a number of people surrounding his vehicle with sticks in their hands. They can be seen attacking the vehicles in the convoy of the BJP leader. While the driver attempts to reverse the car, attackers break the car’s windowpane with a log of wood.
The vehicle after it was attacked
The vehicle after it was attacked
Though the Minister escaped unhurt, his driver and several others suffered critical injuries in the attack.
Speaking to India TV, the Union Minister confirmed that the attack took place in front of the police who merely stood there like mute spectators. He said that the Mamata Banerjee government has turned a blind eye towards the unbridled violence that is being unleashed by her cadres in Bengal.
“TMC goons were involved in the attack. We will file a police complaint,” he said.
West Bengal marred with bloody post-poll violence by TMC workers
Multiple reports of brutal killings, arson, loot, rape and vandalism have come forth from different parts of the state since May 2, when Trinamool Congress (TMC) rose back to power for the third consecutive term in the state. As a result of the violence, hundreds of BJP workers and their families have crossed over to Assam from the Cooch Behar district in north Bengal, where they are being housed in several camps.
MHA forms four-member fact-finding team to probe post-election violence
Concerned over these incidents which claimed several lives and left many injured, the Union Home Ministry has constituted a four-member team to find facts and look into reasons for the post-election violence that has emerged in West Bengal in the last few days.
The team, which would be led by the additional secretary of the ministry, would have to assess the ground situation in the state and submit its report on post poll violence in the next 48-72 hours to the Union Home Ministry.
Turkish state-owned news agency Turkish Radio and Television Corporation (TRT World) has recently published a report on the rising number of Covid cases across the world with an emphasis on India. In a report titled “India sees record daily rises in virus infections, deaths”, TRT World penned down how India has reported over 400,000 cases. While publishing the information about the crisis India is facing, TRT World had used a photograph of burning pyres from Nepal as a featured image.
On both TRT World and TRT World Now (the agency’s account that shares the latest updates) published the said photograph without mentioning that it was from Nepal.
Screenshots of tweets posted by TRT World
Even in the news report, Nepal was mentioned only once under the image. In the rest of the report, there was no mention of Nepal which raises the question over the intention of the editorial team of the Turkish News Agency.
News report by TRT World with same image
The image source was noticed and exposed by a Twitter user codenamed ‘Counter Propaganda Division’ who wrote, “MISINFORMATION ALERT! @TRTWorldNow releases images of Kathmandu crematorium, meaning to depict the Indian death toll. Editorial oversight or deliberate distortion?”
MISINFORMATION ALERT!@TRTWorldNow releases images of Kathmandu crematorium meaning to depict Indian death toll. Editorial oversight or deliberate distortion? pic.twitter.com/uV8mnNPdPd
— Counter Propaganda Division (@CounterDivision) May 6, 2021
The original source of the image was news agency Reuters. The image was first published by Reuters on May 5 in a gallery titled “Nepal overwhelmed by surge of COVID infections”. The photograph depicted workers wearing PPE extending the crematorium amidst a rising number of deaths due to Covid in Kathmandu, Nepal. It was clicked by photojournalist Navesh Chitrakar.
Screenshot of original gallery by Reuters
Obsession of Western Media with cremation pictures
Since the surge of Covid-19 cases in India, the unsettling obsession of the western, and even Indian mainstream media towards the death and destruction caused by the infection has come to light. The reports in international media are filled with photographs of cremation grounds. As a cherry on the top, the news agencies are selling these photographs for hundreds of dollars (Rs.23,000) on stock image websites. The biggest contributors for such images were Hindustan Times, AFP, Nur Photos and others.
Amidst several reports of post-poll violence in West Bengal, an incident of rape and murder has come to the fore from the state’s West Medinipur district. A second-year college student belonging to the SC/ST community, has reportedly been brutally raped and murdered in Jamna village in Pingla block, Kharagpur subdivision of the Paschim Medinipur district in the state of West Bengal.
According to local news reports, the 21-year-old student of Debra College in West Medinipur had gone missing on Monday (May 3) afternoon. When she did not return home until evening, her family members started looking for her. After much searching, the girl’s body was found in an abandoned mud house adjacent to a newly constructed house. According to the reports, the girl’s body was found half-naked.
The family of the deceased alleged that she was killed after being brutally raped.
After learning about the incident, Pingla police reached the spot and sent the body of the deceased for post mortem.
Based on FIR filed by the victim’s family at Pingla police station, the local police arrested two masons and their female aide, who helped in the construction work of the house behind the deceased’s kaccha house. They have been identified as Bikash Murmu from Belda, Chhotu Munda from Jharkhand and Tapati Patra from Sabang.
According to reports, additional SP, Kharagpur, Rana Mukherjee said that the accused have confessed to the crime. While Bikash and Chhotu raped the girl, Tapati kept a watch outside to door. The autopsy report has confirmed rape, said the IPS officer, furthering that the police are reconstructing the crime scene to investigate the case.
Ever since the incident came to the fore, locals in the area held a protest demanding justice for the girl. Youths organised a sit-in protest carrying placards and banners saying demanding justice for the victim.
Following the incident, some social media users claimed that the girl was a BJP supporter, and her rape and murder was part of ongoing TMC violence against BJP and other opposition parties. But so far no evidence supporting that claim has emerged.
Even as the country is fighting a deadly pandemic, the left-wing propagandists in the media are busy propagating misleading news reports to target the Modi government. In one such incident on Thursday, Rohan Venkat, who claims to be a ‘journalist’ for the far-left news website ‘Scroll’, resorted to peddling misinformation by sharing old and misleading reports to attack the Modi government’s response to the coronavirus pandemic. On Thursday, Rohan Venkat took to Twitter to post a report published by another far-left news house ‘The Hindu’ to claim that the Union Science Ministry has funded a trial at the All India Institute of Medical Sciences (AIIMS), Rishikesh to determine the effect of ‘Gayatri Mantra’ in treating Covid-19.
Sharing a news article titled, “Science Ministry funds trial on effect of Gayatri Mantra in treating COVID-19“, Venkat insinuated that the Modi government was funding research on the effects of Gayatri Mantra to find a possible cure for the Covid-19.
The Hindu report shared by Venkat is, in fact, is extremely misleading. The headline of the report suggests that the government is funding research on the effects of Gayatri Mantra on Covid-19. However, if one reads the full report published by the Hindu, the details of the report contradict their own headline.
In the body of the article, it is categorically mentioned that the institute would be researching the effect of chanting Gayatri Mantra and performing Pranayama on Covid-19 patients in addition to usual treatment. However, the Hindu misled its readers by attaching a misleading headline to make its readers believe that the central government is considering using Gayatri Mantra as a stand-alone option to ‘treat’ Covid-19.
Interestingly, the report shared by far-left ‘journalist’ is not even a recent one. The original report, with a misleading headline, was published by the Hindu on March 19. However, Rohan Venkat decided to share the misleading report on his timeline on Thursday to create a wave of propaganda against the Modi government.
Within minutes of Rohan Venkat sharing the misleading post, the usual left-wing propagandists, trolls, alleged fact-checkers descended on Twitter to not only target the centre over its handling of the pandemic but also to discredit the Indian system of medicine such as Ayurveda, Yoga and Pranayama.
Maya Mirchandani, a former anchor at NDTV, sharing the misleading article claimed that she was speechless and said that the government had no scientific temper at all.
Raja Sen, who claims to be a film critic, also shared the misleading news report to ask whether Gayatri Mantra would help falling governments.
Ashok Swain, who has a history of a spreading fake news to abuse Hindus and its customs, took to Twitter to suggest that Science Ministry should be renamed as ‘Pseudoscience Ministry’.
At a time when the country is suffering from one of the greatest crisis in the recent history, the left-wing propagandists and trolls shamelessly used the opportunity to propagate misleading information against the government.
Outlook shares the misleading article
This is not the first time that the mainstream media outlets are resorting to such false propaganda against the Modi government to insinuate that they are considering using Gayatri Mantra to treat the pandemic.
Earlier in March, Outlook had published a news article titled ‘Can Chanting Gayatri Mantra Treat Covid-19? Govt Collaborates With AIIMS Rishikesh To Find Out’.
Article published by Outlook on March 19, 2021.
Though in the body of the article it is mentioned that the AIIMS Rishikesh would be researching the effect of chanting Gayatri Mantra and performing Pranayama on Covid-19 patients in addition to usual treatment, the misleading headline suggested that the central government is considering using Gayatri Mantra as an independent treatment for the Covid-19.
Has government funded trial on effect of Gayatri Mantra in treating COVID-19?
Contrary to the claims of Rohan Venkat, the Science Ministry is not funding AIIMS Rishikesh to start any experiment to determine if the chanting of the Gayatri Mantra or performing the Yoga practice of Pranayama would be a cure for Covid-19.
In reality, it is not a stand-alone trial, but this will be done along with the regular medical treatment which is otherwise given to the patients suffering from the infection. In fact, the Hindu report, quoted by Rohan Venkat itself clarifies that the 20 Covid-19 patients with moderate symptoms have been divided into two groups and one will get the standard treatment, and the other group will be subject to a regimen of chanting and breathing exercises for 14 days, supervised by a certified yoga instructor, “along with the standard treatment”.
“Then the groups will be compared on whether those who have received the additional treatment show measurably improved markers for inflammation or cell-injury. Among the causes for severe COVID-19 is an exaggerated reaction by the body’s immune systems to the presence of the virus, which leads to severe cellular inflammation and damage that can prove fatal. While several experimental therapies exist, there is yet no specific drug proven to improve health outcomes,” reads the Hindu report shared by Rohan Venkat.
The Hindu report published on March 19.
Further, the body of the Hindu report states, “The latest study, however, will not test the effect of the intervention on severely ill patients. It will evaluate whether there are differences in the groups on the time taken to test negative, and the length of their hospital stay.”
Even though it is clearly mentioned in the report that the trials are not a stand-alone experiment to determine whether Gayatri Mantra and Yoga could be a possible cure for Covid-19, the far-left journalist indulged in the mischievous act of spreading fake news. In his attempt to target the Modi government, Rohan Venkat successfully created myths around traditional practices such as Yoga and Pranayama that have been proved extremely beneficial for strengthening human respiratory illnesses.
Yoga and Pranayama – a time tested practise to strengthen human health
It is a well-known fact that controlled breathing or Pranayama is a specific set of respiratory exercises within yoga that has been proved extremely beneficial for strengthening the lungs and fighting respiratory illnesses. Since Covid-19 infection directly impacts a person’s lungs, damaging the walls and linings of the air sacs in the lungs, it is only common sense that these deep breathing exercises will surely be beneficial for the patients fighting the COVID-19 infection.
Moreover, it has been specifically found that chanting of the Gayatri mantra elevates a person’s mind and soul to a higher level. The vibrations created by the chanting of The Mantra stimulate the penial gland, which helps in release Endorphins and other relaxing hormones in the body that helps keep depression at bay.
This again will prove effective to treat the various traumatic stressors, including anxiety, depression, posttraumatic stress disorder, and other trauma- and stress-related disorders that the Covid-19 patient might suffer. Isolation, loss of income and fear are triggering mental health conditions or exacerbating existing ones in coronavirus patients.
Meanwhile, Covid-19 can lead to neurological and mental complications, such as delirium, agitation, and stroke. People with pre-existing mental, neurological or substance use disorders are also more vulnerable to SARS-CoV-2 infection ̶ they may stand a higher risk of severe outcomes and even death. In such a situation, reciting Gayatri Mantra would only help these patients to fight stress and strain, making them more resilient.
Basically, the central government is not trying to replace the medical treatment of Covid-19 patients with Gayatri Mantra or Pranayama, as the likes of Rohan Venkat suggests, but is only trying to introduce it as an additional treatment, which might accelerate the recovery of the patients.
In a recent twitter post, Arvind Jha, who currently serves as a Senior Vice President for Software Development in Newgen Software and a prominent supporter of the Aam Aadmi Party in New Delhi and the Rashtriya Janata Dal in Bihar tweeted extolling the way in which Kerala was managing the COVID-19 pandemic. Mr. Jha in a tweet on May 5th stated, “How Ernakulam, Kerala manages its “war” room. No need for desperate heroics’’ that contained a video of a control room with a voiceover explaining what was being achieved.
This was further retweeted and amplified by other verified handles who alluded to the fact that it was an initiative of the Government of Kerala.
Open source software in Ernakulam #Covid war room. The dashboard software supports the strong Public healthcare system which is all hardware, trained medical professionals & community health workers. https://t.co/H6j9MjSNUs
The irony of this tweet is that Mr. Jha was actually tweeting about the Integrated Command and Control Centre that was fully funded by the Government of India as a part of the Smart City Mission. The Ministry of Housing and Urban Affairs (MoHUA) had conceived of 100 smart cities to drive economic growth and improve the quality of life of people by enabling local area development and harnessing technology, especially technology that leads to Smart outcomes.
Individual cities could prioritise the interventions based on their needs. The Cochin Smart Mission Limited (CSML) is one such Special Purpose Vehicle (SPV) set up to implement smart city projects in Cochin under Smart City Mission (SCM).
One of the tenders released in 2018 by CSML was for the establishment of Integrated Command, Control and Communication Centre (IC4). The IC4 was envisaged to act as the brain of the smart city, which gathers all the information of smart solutions of different departments of the city using ICT (Information and communication technology) and is analyzed for better planning of the city. It has Business Intelligence and Artificial Intelligence (AI) engine which will process all the information and generate insights. These insights will be helpful in managing incidents across the city and do a better planning for the development. It also plays the role of decision support system.
The project was awarded for a cost of approximately 75 crores and this included Cloud infrastructure for hosting, Civil Work, Safety Instrumentation and Furniture (at CCR), the Video walls, workstations and other productivity tools, communication software and smart city solutions, GIS software and integrations with existing.
Several of the smart cities have gone live and have started to be deployed for planning and administration by various. The idea of such a Command and Control Centre while improving efficiencies during normal times have come as a real boon in the pandemic times. In Early April, CM of Uttar Pradesh Yogi Adityanath visited the Lucknow Command and Control Center to see how it was being used by the city administration. YouTube link below:
With India’s capacity to produce medical oxygen increased by 300%, the Government of India is taking steady steps to increase the capacity further and mitigate any shortage of demand.
For the same, the Centre has given a nod to the state of Uttar Pradesh government for setting up new oxygen plants in 37 districts. Post-approval, the Yogi Adityanath government has directed its officials to start preparations for setting up these plants at the earliest.
With 743 tonnes of oxygen being made available, efforts are on to take it up to 800 tonnes per day, said Uttar Pradesh CM Adityanath.
“We are working to improve the availability of oxygen. Seven institutes like IIT-Kanpur, BHU, IIM-Lucknow, AKTU, MMTU Gorakhpur and Moti Lal Nehru Regional Engineering College Prayagraj, have been asked to carry out an oxygen audit in districts,” he added.
“They will look at the demand and supply in each district, number of beds available in all the hospitals, oxygen supplied etc. This will help us gauge the exact demand in the state and where we need to focus the resources,” the CM informed.
Enhancing infrastructural capabilities
The CM also informed that the Railways and the Air Force have been assisting the state by airlifting empty oxygen tankers and the Oxygen Express bringing them back after refills.
A government spokesperson apprised of the arrangements made and informed that 4,370 oxygen concentrators have been made available to all districts with each community health centre being equipped with 20 concentrators.
Growth in medical oxygen production capacity
The excess demand for medical oxygen was unprecedented as even during the peak of the first COVID-19 wave in India, maximum demand was not more than 3,000 tonnes a day.
To bridge the gap, India’s corporate giants have pitched in to help increase the production capacity with the Reliance Group, Tata Steels, Jindal and AMNS producing medical oxygen and offering additional infrastructure to support the same.
The Government of India, in fag end of April gave in-principle approval for allocating funds to install 551 dedicated Pressure Swing Adsorption (PSA) Medical Oxygen Generation Plants and procuring 1 lakh oxygen concentrators for supply to high-burden states across the nation from the PM Cares Fund.
As of date, medical oxygen availability has increased to 9,200 tonnes a day and attempts are being made to increase it further.
