Delhi Deputy Chief Minister Manish Sisodia, on Wednesday, slammed the Centre for committing “fraud” against the people of Delhi by not allowing the state government to form a panel to look into deaths caused by a shortage of oxygen during the April to May second wave of Covid-19.
Addressing a press conference, Sisodia alleged that the Centre does not want a probe into the deaths due to oxygen shortage because the truth of their negligence will surface. “The Central government is once more working as a fraud in identifying the deaths due to oxygen shortage during the second wave of Covid-19. I have received a letter from the Union Health Minister Mansukh Mandavia.”
He wrote in the letter that there does not seem to be a justification for forming a committee to investigate the deaths due to lack of oxygen. “The Central government is saying that there is no need to form a committee because a task force has been formed under the order of the Supreme Court. However, the five points of the task force that is being formed are recommendations for the coming time on how oxygen will be managed,” said Sisodia.
“In the coming times, how would be the demand of oxygen, how will the distribution of oxygen monitored and what changes will be made from time to time and it is meant to suggest. The Health Minister is saying that because the Supreme Court has constituted a task force, there is no need to form a committee to investigate the people who have died due to the misdeeds of the Central government in the country and in Delhi. I do not think that any Central government would have ever done such a big fraud,” he added further.
Sisodia asked, “In the task force by the Supreme Court that was constituted on 6 May, the force is to work on 12 points. None of them is related to deaths due to lack of oxygen. Both the facts presented by the Central government are wrong. When the Central government has to work according to the task force set up by the Supreme Court, then why did they ask the state governments for the figures of deaths due to lack of oxygen?”
“I want to request the Health Minister to let this matter be probed so that it can be found out who was at fault and how many people have died due to lack of oxygen,” he added.