Karnataka Pradesh Congress Committee (KPCC) president D.K. Shivakumar on Friday demanded a judicial probe by a sitting judge of the High Court into his party’s charges of corruption in COVID-19 management by the State government. The government, he alleged, was making money over COVID-19 corpses even as it has failed to offer decent burial/cremation to the deceased.
Speaking to reporters here in his first-ever visit outside Bengaluru after taking charge as the PCC president, Mr. Shivakumar said the BJP government that talks of transparency in equipment procurement to fight COVID-19 was not even prepared to allow proceedings of the Public Accounts Committee (PAC). The Congress, he said, would submit documents to support its charges before the judicial commission if it was set up, he said.
Alleging that the State government’s corruption was bigger than the pandemic itself, Mr. Shivakumar released a booklet titled “Coronadalli Bhrashtachara; BJP Sarkarada Samskara,” containing various newspaper clippings to support the allegation. The Congress had been seeking details of rates fixed for various equipment to fight COVID-19, both from the Central government and the Sate government, to which there was no response.
Giving examples, Mr. Shivakumar said the party had procured oxymeters at ₹565 per piece under its Arogya Hastha scheme whereas the government had procured the same for ₹1,500. Half-a-litre sanitiser which the Congress got for ₹100 was procured by the government for ₹600. The government had paid upto ₹4,000 for a thermal scanner while it was available just for ₹1,050.
“While the government was neck-deep in corruption, it has failed to provide relief to the affected people. Compensation announced for various categories of unorganised workers, including autorickshaw drivers and washermen, has not been paid,” Mr. Shivakumar said. His party had supported the government in every aspect of COVID-19 management, but not any more “when every act of the government smacks of loads of corruption.”
Mr. Shivakumar said the Congress had to force the government to help people thus setting up benchmarks, be it free travel to migrant workers on trains or on KSRTC buses or distribution of relief kits to the unorganised sector.
Offer free treatment for COVID-19
Reiterating his party’s demand for free treatment for COVID-19 affected people in government as well as private hospitals, Mr. Shivakumar alleged that the government was hand in glove with private hospitals while forcing people to pay through their nose for treatment.
Fixing the rates for treatment in private hospitals itself was wrong, Mr. Shivakumar told reporters, adding this indicated the government’s ‘collusion’ with private hospitals. “It was the government that gifted COVID-19 to people through numerous omissions and hence it had the responsibility to treat people free of cost,” he added.
Former Ministers U.T. Khader, B. Ramanath Rai, and Vinay Kumar Sorake, Dakshina Kannada DCC president K. Harish Kumar, former legislators and others were present.