Ruchika M Khanna

Tribune News Service

Chandigarh, April 30

It’s 11.30 in the morning and the shrill sound of mobile phones buzzing incessantly reveals the urgency and desperation of callers. Calls are answered immediately by officials and all have the same message — “…our district is running out of oxygen. This is an SOS call…please ensure supply as soon as possible.”

As senior state officials, including Rahul Tiwari, Rajat Aggarwal, Pradeep Aggarwal, Abhinav Trikha and Harpreet Sudan, examine calls, they try to maintain calm and calculate the time it would take for oxygen supplies from other states to reach Punjab districts.

Such tense scenes continue to play inside the oxygen control room, which was set up on the orders of Punjab Chief Minister Capt Amarinder Singh earlier this week.

Yesterday, there was an SOS call from Amritsar, claiming hospitals were running out of oxygen. Following this, supplies from Fatehgarh Sahib and Jalandhar were diverted to Amritsar. Set up in what till recently was the plush office of the Bureau of Investment, Punjab, the makeshift control room has remained active from 6 am to 2 am since it was set up five days ago. The idea behind the control room was to monitor and manage oxygen supplies to hospitals in all 22 districts.

The officials, however, say as the caseload goes up (54,954 till yesterday, of which 648 required oxygen supply), their work gets more difficult. “The state thrives on zero stock and supplies are managed just a day in advance,” said one of the officials.

As of now, the daily demand for liquid oxygen is 200 MT. The state has the production capacity of 60 MT, while the Centre has allocated an additional 145 MT of liquid oxygen from plants outside Punjab. However, logistic challenges as well as delays in getting supplies when some plants close for maintenance purposes is leading to shortage of almost 20 per cent oxygen a day.

Managing supplies

Set up in what till recently was the plush office of the Bureau of Investment, Punjab, the makeshift control room has remained active from 6 am to 2 am since it was set up five days ago. The purpose is to monitor and manage oxygen supplies to hospitals in all districts.