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Uttarakhand CM, ex-CM trade barbs on fake Covid tests during Kumbh Mela
The controversy turned political on Thursday as former CM Rawat called for an impartial investigation
Uttarakhand chief minister Tirath Singh Rawat and former chief minister Trivendra Singh Rawat clashed on Thursday over allegations of fake Covid tests during the Kumbh Mela in Haridwar as police lodged the first FIR in the case against a local agency accused of fabricating thousands of rapid tests.
The state health department lodged an FIR against Max Corporate Services, Delhi-based Lalchandani Labs and Hisar-based Nalwa Labs on the basis of a complaint by Haridwar chief medical officer Shambhu Kumar Jha. The three labs were booked for negligence, spreading disease, cheating and criminal conspiracy, and under sections of the 2005 disaster management act and the 1897 epidemic diseases act.
The controversy also turned political on Thursday as former CM Rawat called for an impartial investigation. “This (the testing allegations) is a serious crime, not negligence. Stringent action should be taken and an impartial investigation should be conducted,” Rawat said.
Later in the day, CM Rawat defended himself. “I came in March and this is an old issue. When we got information about this, we immediately instituted an inquiry... Strict action will be taken against the guilty,” he said.
Tirath Singh Rawat replaced Trivendra Singh Rawat in March this year, weeks before the mega holy event was to kick off in Haridwar. One of the CM’s first decisions was to approve a full-scale Kumbh mela despite experts warning that social distancing and adequate testing will be impossible at a time infections were climbing across the country. Eventually, 9.1 million pilgrims took the holy dip in the Ganga from January 14 to April 27. The bulk of this — at least six million people — congregated in April, coinciding with the worst surge in the second wave.
Allegations of fake testing surfaced last week after a Faridkot resident complained to the authorities that he received a message for collecting his Covid report despite never having been tested. The complaint triggered a probe that unearthed roughly 100,000 fake rapid antigen tests.
Real-time data checking through the Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR) portal revealed fake entries on basis of mobile numbers and addresses of people who were never tested. Many people said they had not even visited Haridwar in April.
In Haridwar, station house officer of city police station, Rajesh Shah, said Max Corporate Services brought in Nalva Lab and Lalchandani Lab by signing a pact. These labs conducted tests at five places in Haridwar.
Max Corporate Services (a private firm unrelated to the Max healthcare group) didn’t respond to requests for a comment. Nalva Labs denied the allegations and said while the lab signed an MoU with Max, there was no financial transactions and the agreement was called off in April last week.
Lalchandani Labs also denied the allegations and said they only conducted 10,000 rapid tests. “We conducted the tests in the first 20 days.... we were asked to conduct RT-PCR tests, which was not logistically possible so we stopped,” said Arjan Lalchandani, managing director.
The Kumbh Mela Health administration has opened a separate probe and will reach out to every person whose name and mobile number was found in the Covid-19 testing data. “A four-member panel is probing this matter,” said Mela Health officer Dr Arjun Singh Sengar.
During the Kumbh from April 1 to 30, 600,831 Covid-19 tests were conducted of which only 17,317 were positive. This translated to a positivity rate of 2.88% at a time the whole state was reporting 14% infection rate.
