NEW DELHI: Launching a scathing attack on the Centre, Deputy Chief Minister Manish Sisodia on Wednesday said the BJP was committing a “fraud” over the number of deaths caused by the lack of oxygen supply at the peak of the second wave of Covid in the national capital.
“The Union Health Minister claims that the mandate given by the Supreme Court for the National Task Force is related to deaths occurring due to the lack of oxygen. But the 12-point agenda directed by the
Supreme Court to the National Task Force is related to supply of oxygen to hospitals and management for the future,” asserted Sisodia.
He had previously written to Union Health Minister Mansukh Mandaviya reiterating that an investigation committee would be necessary to correctly ascertain the number of such deaths.
The Delhi government on Wednesday received a response from Mandaviya. In the response, according to the Delhi government, the Union Health Minister has said that the National Task Force was set up on May 6 and it has 12 terms of reference out of which five are related to the oxygen supply.
For this reason, setting up a committee by the Delhi government was not required.
“When it has not been mentioned anywhere in the mandate of the Task Force to investigate the deaths that occurred due to oxygen shortage, the Union Health Minister is claiming that there is no need to set up an investigation committee to ascertain the number of deaths due to the oxygen shortage. This is a huge fraud by the Centre,” said the Deputy CM, who is also the Nodal Minister of Covid-19 in Delhi.
Sisodia accused the Centre of “falsely interpreting” the national task force, saying it was being done because the reason behind such deaths is “PM Modi’s irresponsibility and mismanagement of oxygen supply”.