All-party team should monitor Covid, floods, says Bihar CM

PATNA: CM Nitish Kumar on Monday urged Vidhan Sabha speaker Vijay Kumar Choudhary to form an all-party committee to monitor the state health department’s initiatives to combat the spread of the Covid-19 virus in Bihar.
“Our fight against Covid-19 is not a political issue. We all should unite and take a joint responsibility to protect the lives of our people, residents of this state, from the threat of Covid-19,” the CM said while replying to a special debate on ‘Covid-19 and flood situation in the state’. He further said that the proposed committee would hold its meeting every 15 days and review the actions being taken by the health department.
“Though it is the last session of the 16th Vidhan Sabha, the House still has its tenure till November. The committee can function till the end of tenure of the current Vidhan Sabha,” the CM said. The five-year term of the current Vidhan Sabha expires on November 29 this year.
Nitish, who leads a coalition government, further called upon the leaders of all political parties to come forward and work in unison for the state government’s fight against the Covid-19 virus.
He also said that nobody knew as to what extent this infection would spread. “A few days back, BJP MLC Sunil Kumar Singh (of Darbhanga) died of Covid-19. Only yesterday, the CPI state secretary and former MLA Satya Narain Singh died of the infection. Let all of us take responsibility to protect the lives of our people,” Nitish said while making a fervent appeal to political parties to unite on the issue of Covid-19.
Intervening into the CM’s speech, the leader of opposition Tejashwi Prasasd Yadav urged the CM to depute all MLAs in their respective areas to monitor Covid-19 and flood situation. “By doing so, the state government will get feedback from the elected representatives about the officers’ work on a regular basis,” Tejashwi said and urged the CM not to rely on feedback from bureaucrats.
Earlier, the truncated one-day Monsoon session of the assembly passed altogether 12 bills within an hour, without going for a detailed debate on the bills due to shortening of the session because of Covid-19.
Supplementary budget passed: The assembly on Monday passed the state government’s first supplementary budget (for FY 2020-21) of Rs 22,777.32 crore. Deputy CM Sushil Kumar Modi presented the supplementary budget in the House.