‘Wake up from slumber’: HC pulls up Uttarakhand govt over Kumbh, Purnagiri mela

The Uttarakhand High Court on Monday pulled up the state government for continuing to allow religious events despite a surge in coronavirus cases and doubted its preparedness to deal with the pandemic asking it to ldquowake up from slumberrdquoWe cannot behave like the proverbial ostrich and bury our head in sand in the face of the pandemic Chief Justice R S Chauhan and Justice Alok Kumar Verma said while hearing a PIL on the governments handling of the pandemicThe bench asked why the state was still not prepared despite combating the pandemic for more than a year and reminded the government about predictions of a third waveThe court said the while the state reeled under the effect of the Kumbh Mela the Purnagiri Mela took place attracting a crowd of 10000 people It asked whether the rise in coronavirus cases in Kumaon was a result of that melaThe court questioned the state government for the confusion over the Chardham yatra asking whether the annual pilgrimage will be allowed to become a coronavirus hotbedWhile the government says the yatra has been cancelled the board managing the temples has issued the standard operating procedure SOP for the yatra it saidHow can we make sure that it will be followed when the same was flouted during the Kumbh Mela it asked referring to the SOPThe court directed the state government to pool all its resources in the fight against the pandemicWe are fighting a world war with an invisible enemy and must put in all the resources Under Article 21 of the Constitution it is the foremost duty of the state to preserve the life of its citizens The government must pour every drop into it the bench saidOn a detailed report filed by Health Secretary Amit Negi on strengthening medical facilities over the past few months the high court said it was not enough to fight the second wave let alone the thirdNegi submitted that 1338 ICU beds and 892 ventilators are available in the state now The number of oxygen concentrators has increased from 637 to 5700Since March oxygen beds have increased from 275 to 1293 and 200 more will be available in the next 15 to 20 days The state has 29000 isolation beds Two temporary hospitals are coming up within a few days and there are 10 government and 26 private testing labsNegi said the Centre has allotted 75000 Remdesivir injections to Uttarakhand Out of them about 25000 have been delivered and 2000 being made available every dayThe high court said the peak of the second wave is yet to come and these preparations were not enoughIt said the predictions of the scientific community about the second wave were ignored We are now paying through our noses to make up for itrdquoThe bench said the government and the people must fight together to overcome the predicted third wave The Government by making necessary SOPs and infrastructure the people by following guidelines it addedThe court asked the government to increase testing labs particularly in epicentres such as Haridwar and deploy mobile testing vans in remote areasThe bench pointed out that under Disaster Management Act the government may altogether skip the process of inviting tenders to expedite the processThis is necessary in the current situation as 2737 of the cases are being reported from the hilly regions and many more are going unreported the judges said The court also asked the government to take action against private hospitals charging exorbitant fees from Covid19 patientsThose involved in blackmarketing hoarding and selling fake medicines must face severe punishment under the Drugs and Cosmetics Act it saidThe judges said SOPs must be put in place to deal with the increasing biomedical waste due to pandemicThe court directed the Government to file a supplementary affidavit specifically addressing its queries and asked the health secretary to be present at the next hearing on May 20This story has been sourced from a third party syndicated feed agencies Midday accepts no responsibility or liability for its dependability trustworthiness reliability and data of the text Midday managementmiddaycom reserves the sole right to alter delete or remove without notice the content in its absolute discretion for any reason whatsoever