PremiumBJP leader Devendra Fadnavis on Saturday alleged that the Shiv Sena-controlled civic body was under-reporting COVID-19 deaths in Mumbai.
The Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC) was attributing the deaths of some COVID-19 patients to other reasons and thus suppressing the real toll of the viral infection, he said in a letter to Maharashtra Chief Minister Uddhav Thackeray.
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Premium Premium "The 'death due to other reasons' category has to be used only in exceptional cases, like when a COVID-19 patient commits suicide, dies in an accident, is murdered, is brain-dead or a fourth-stage cancer patient," Fadnavis said.
The BMC was classifying some COVID-19 deaths in this category in a dubious way, the former chief minister hinted.
Notably, the Supreme Court had recently praised the Mumbai civic body for managing the second wave of the pandemic efficiently.
Fadnavis further said the BMC reported deaths of 683 COVID-19 patients under this "suspicious category" of `death due to other reasons' between February to April.
This accounted for 39.4 per cent of total 1,773 deaths reported in the city during the period, he claimed.
"In the same period, at least 15,958 people died in the rest of the state and of these, 119 were shown as `death due to other reasons', which is 0.7 per cent," the BJP leader said in the letter.
As per the BMC, the city's coronavirus caseload as of Friday was 6,71,394 and death toll 13,687. PTI ND ARU KRK KRK
This story has been published from a wire agency feed without modifications to the text.
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