The Congress on Friday slammed the State Election Commission (SEC) and the TRS government for announcing the schedule for holding elections to two municipal corporations and five municipalities when the State was gripped with COVID and elections were proving to be super-spreaders of the virus.
Former Minister and senior Congress leader Mohammed Ali Shabbir said at a press conference here on Friday that it looked ridiculous that the SEC had announced the poll schedule within two hours after the government announced cancellation of SSC exams and postponement of Intermediate exams in view of spiralling COVID cases.
“The TRS government shuts down all schools, but permits liquor shops to operate till late in the night, and also prefers to conduct municipal elections where lakhs of people are involved, and this dual approach by Chief Minister K. Chandrasekhar Rao and his government is quite puzzling,” he said and demanded the postponement of municipal elections.
Mr. Shabbir Ali said that Mr. KCR was apparently the only Chief Minister in the country who did not hold any review meeting on the COVID situation. “His only focus is on politics. He is least bothered whether people live or die due to coronavirus. His only concern is to win the elections at any cost,” he charged.
The Congress leader alleged that the State government had completely failed to deal with the virus situation, and there was a huge contradiction in the claims being made by Health Minister Eatala Rajender regarding the availability of facilities in government hospitals. He said no beds were available, either in government or private hospitals, anywhere in the State. Further, there was a huge shortage of oxygen in many government hospitals. Similarly, the ventilator beds were not available even at a premium, he alleged.
Although the medical bulletins show that over 2,500 beds are vacant in GHMC limits, which include 1,466 beds in Gandhi Hospital and 806 in TIMS, a Congress leader from Kamareddy could not get a bed despite personally speaking to the Health Minister for his intervention. He accused the government of hiding real statistics and exaggerating the details of healthcare facilities.
