Union Minister Prahlad Patel on Thursday allegedly threatened to slap a man in Madhya Pradesh’s Damoh when the latter asked the minister to arrange an oxygen cylinder for his ailing mother. A video of the incident went viral later.
As a man whose mother was admitted to the District Hospital Damoh and oxygen wasn’t available, encountered the minister during his visit there, the Minister got angry and said, “Aise baat karega to do khayega (If you talk like this, you will get two (slaps).”
The hapless man replied that he was ready to be beaten up, but oxygen should be arranged for his mother. He said that the oxygen cylinder he got only lasted for two hours.
The Minister later tried to handle the situation saying none is denying help but the man should use proper language.
Later, BJP spokesperson Dr Ashish Agrawal speaking to News 18 said that the Minister was a sensitive politician and he wasn’t aware about the situation in which he used such words. He, however, said that everyone should keep composure in the present situation.
Congress MLA Kunal Chaudhary took strong objection to the Minister’s words saying it was unbecoming of a senior politician and it was good that the man kept his cool otherwise he could have lost temper seeing his mother on deathbed.
Meanwhile, the BJP government in the State has planned to revamp oxygen supplies.
Medical Education Minister Vishwas Sarang on Thursday said that the numbers of hospital beds have been increased to 4,69,20 in the State and daily testing capacity of Covid-19 has been increased to 46,000. On Wednesday, 46,000 metric tonnes of oxygen was available while the demand was around 382 tonnes.
Under the Centre’s assistance, five district hospitals including Indore, Gwalior, Shahdol, Rewa and Gwalior will get PSA technique based oxygen plants worth Rs 1.60 cr each shortly. These plants have the oxygen generation capacity of 300-400 litre per minute.
“We have decided to install PSA technique based plants in eight districts, and work in four districts has got underway already,” said the Minister, adding that 37 districts in the State will get plants on the same technique in next few months.
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