BENGALURU: The state police have gone that extra mile in helping not only the police personnel, but the general public with the allimportant oxygen concentrators, which were donated by philanthropists for policemen.
“People are donating oxygen concentrators for police personnel, but we felt that to only restrict their use for our people would be selfish at a time when there is an acute shortage of oxygen,” said Director General and Inspector General (DG&IGP) Praveen Sood.
He said he had received 17 concentrators, which have been donated to district hospitals through district superintendents of police (SPs) and district commissioners.
“The objective is that oxygen should be made available to all in need, but priority should be given to frontline police personnel, who need oxygen,” said the police chief.
He added that because of aggressive mass vaccination of the police force, only 100 police personnel have been hospitalised in the second wave, while the others who got infected are in home isolation.
“Out of 87,775 police personnel, 73,503 have received both doses of the vaccine,” he added. Meanwhile, Additional Director General of Police, Anti- Corruption Bureau (ACB), Seemant Kumar Singh with the help of a group of donors donated 130 oxygen concentrators to district hospitals in the last 25 days.
“We donated oxygen concentrators free of cost to all 30 districts in the State in the last 25 days. This was possible through donors from across the country and overseas. We have formed a WhatsApp group -- O2 -- which has donors and people who search where oxygen concentrators can be sourced from and inform the group. The donors then import them and I facilitate their distribution through district SPs,” said Singh.
The ADGP said that to make use of the oxygen concentrators, he on the advice of the DG&IGP roped in the SPs.
Last year, Singh had helped over one lakh migrant workers with free ration. He had also helped their movement back to their native places by train after his personal phone had gone viral as helpline number.