Punjab government under-reporting Covid deaths: Bhagwant Mann

Chandigarh, April 16

The Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) on Friday demanded that Chief Minister Amarinder Singh give an account of the money collected in the Punjab CM Covid Relief Fund.

AAP state president and MP Bhagwant Mann also sought details of where the funds had been spent so far.

The Punjab Chief Minister Covid Relief Fund was set up by the state government in March last year for the welfare of people in distress due to the coronavirus pandemic.

"The money of the public cannot be kept secret. Amarinder Singh should give an account of the money collected in the Covid relief fund," Mann said in a statement here.

It has been more than a year since COVID-19 came to the country and even the first wave of the pandemic has passed but the state government hospitals do not have an adequate number of ventilators yet, he claimed.

He further said, "To counter the second wave properly, the number of beds in hospitals has also not been increased yet. When the government has not done anything, the question arises that what did it do with the crores of rupees collected in the name of Covid relief fund."  

Mann said the number of COVID-19 patients and the mortality rate in the state have been rising but Singh is busy promoting himself in the name of disease rather than improving the health facilities.

He also alleged that the state government was under-reporting deaths.

"Hundreds of people are dying every day due to the lack of treatment but the names of all those people are not being included in the government records. The number of people dying due to the pandemic is many times higher than what the government is reporting," he claimed.

On Thursday, Punjab's COVID-19 tally surged to 2,86,816 with a record daily high of 4,333 fresh cases, according to a medical bulletin.

The death toll climbed to 7,722 with 51 more fatalities, the bulletin stated. PTI

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