Niranjan Patnaik slams government for poor Covid management

BHUBANESWAR: President of Odisha Pradesh Congress Committee (OPCC) Niranjan Patnaik on Friday strongly criticised the State Government for poor Covid-19 management in the Capital and demanded urgent attention to the people of the city in view of the growing number of positive cases.

The apathy and callousness with which citizens of Bhubaneswar are being treated is extremely unfortunate, the OPCC president said in a letter to Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik.

Patnaik requested the Chief Minister to get a review done by the Chief Secretary to find out why there is universal anger against the Bhubaneswar Municipal Corporation (BMC) cutting across class divide. “In normal times this level of anger would have manifested in agitational programme. But, these are not normal times,” he said.

Alleging that BMC officials are not approachable and are only interested in one-way communication, Patnaik said it is difficult to speak to the Ward Officer, let alone the BMC Commissioner. The helpline number is often expressing helplessness, he said and added that the BMC is relying too much on antigen test and the number of RT-PCR tests is inadequate.