After attending an all-party meeting with Home Minister Amit Shah, Delhi Congress chief Ch. Anil Kumar said that the Central and State governments had finally woken up to the threat that COVID-19 posed in Delhi.
The two governments, Mr. Kumar said, finally admitted that there was a surge in the number of cases in the city due to inadequate testing and contact tracing and wondered why the meeting was not held 84 days ago, on March 23, when the lockdown was imposed.
The Delhi Congress, he said, will be holding dharnas on Tuesday at over 1,000 locations across the city to protest against the failures of both governments in power for letting the situation spiral out of control. He said that Congress workers will sit on protest, wearing black bands, outside the door of their homes encourage people to hold the government accountable.
“It is due to the incompetence and failure of both governments that the COVID-19 pandemic has made a fast surge in the Capital. There is less testing and a severe shortage of beds for patients leading to panic among the people of Delhi. Precious time was wasted during the lockdown when preparations could have been made,” Mr. Kumar said.
The Delhi Congress gave 11 suggestions at the all-party meeting that included converting school and college hostels into isolation centres and throwing open three Delhi government hospitals which are nearing completion and have a combined strength of 2,609 beds. The party objected to the use of train coaches to lodge quarantine patients as it would not be comfortable for patients to be put up in non-AC, cramped train coaches in this hot weather.
Mr. Kumar said that he reiterated his demand of an immediate relief of ₹10,000 for all COVID-19 patient and their families living in the containment zones.
Also, among the suggestions made were compensation to the COVID-19 warriors in Delhi, including health workers and police personnel, who died on duty and that final year MBBS, Nursing and B. Pharma students be deployed to fight the pandemic.
