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HC seeks govt affidavit on Covid crisis, oxygen gap
PATNA The Patna High Court on Thursday asked Bihar’s chief secretary to file a detailed affidavit with regard to lack of infrastructure in hospitals, men and equipment, testing, availability of medicines and oxygen, disposal of bio waste and black marketing in a tabular form by Friday, when it will hear the matter again
PATNA
The Patna High Court on Thursday asked Bihar’s chief secretary to file a detailed affidavit with regard to lack of infrastructure in hospitals, men and equipment, testing, availability of medicines and oxygen, disposal of bio waste and black marketing in a tabular form by Friday, when it will hear the matter again.
The court was particularly concerned about oxygen availability and sough to know why the state was unable to lift the quantity allocated by the Centre and what was being done to ensure that full allocation was lifted.
Appearing for the Bihar government, senior counsel Vikas Singh said that against the demand of 300 metric tonnes (MTs) of oxygen, the state had been allocated 210 MTs, but so far the state was able to lift 154 MTs only due to lack of tankers for transportation of liquid medical oxygen (LMO).
“We are engaging private parties for transportation of oxygen. Jharkhand has also given six tankers and the Indian Oil Corporation (IOC) three. We are also trying other means to augment supply. Once we are able to lift the allocated quota, we will seek more from the Centre. Transportation is a problem, which the government is trying to sort out. The state is also generating around 40 MTs of oxygen,” he said.
Additional solicitor general (ASG) KN Singh, however, informed the court that the Centre had so far provided 13 tankers to the state government for transportation, though it was the state’s responsibility to lift the allocated supply. “Tankers used for other purposes have also been deployed for transportation of oxygen. Besides, the state also uses its own tankers,” he said.
The bench of chief justice Sanjay Karol and Justice Sanjay Kumar made it clear they were interested in results. “We are not here to govern. We are not the government. We are here only to see that governance is done. We are conscious of our duties. At this point of time, we don’t want to form any opinion. We have sought a detailed affidavit from the chief secretary and want the state to coordinate for transportation of oxygen,” it said.
As soon as the hearing began at 11 am, the new bench headed by the chief justice said the state was not able to transport even the allocated quota of oxygen and sought a detailed reply in the afternoon regarding present requirement as well as projected future requirement, besides status of tankers deployed for transportation..
“As far as oxygen is concerned, what we have gathered from the previous proceedings is that the stand the state has taken is at a variance . While the state put the allocated quota from the Centre at 194 MTs initially, it was later revised to 164 MTs. The state has not been able to transport even that much. The figures supplied with regard to oxygen quota from various companies earlier also don’t match,” the bench said.
The bench also wanted to know if there was blackmarketing and hoarding and who was taking action against them. “We have to save every human life, because if we fail to do that, we will be failing in our constitutional duty,” the bench said.
On Tuesday, the bench of Justice Chakradhari Sharan Singh and Justice Mohit Kumar Shah had made strong observations against the inept handling of the Covid crisis and went to the extent of saying that “All of us feel ashamed for what we have done”, but refrained from passing any order, which was reserved for May 6.
However, on Thursday, the bench was changed.
