Bihar: Industries minister Shahnawaz Hussain launches 24x7 oxygen bank of BIA

PATNA: The state industries minister, Shahnawaz Hussain, launched the 24x7 oxygen bank of the Bihar Industries Association (BIA) here on Monday.
Addressing the virtual workshop on ‘Oxygen Production and Promotion Policy 2021’ organised by the BIA, he said his department has been working closely with the health department to meet the increased demand for oxygen due to the Covid-19 pandemic and to ensure an uninterrupted supply of oxygen at hospitals and the supply of liquid oxygen in the state.
The minister appreciated the BIA initiative to supply free oxygen to individuals for emergency purposes.BIA president Ram Lal Khetan said the oxygen will be supplied to individuals only when they deposit the security money. “The money will be returned once they returned the oxygen cylinder. Right now, we have 150 oxygen cylinder, each has a capacity of 10 litres. We have procured 600 oxygen cylinders from an Ahmedabad supplier, however, 450 cylinders have been sent to different district for use,” he said.
Brijesh Mehrotra, the additional chief secretary of the industries department highlighted the Oxygen Production and Promotion Policy and said that Bihar has become the first state in the country to come up with such a policy.
“In Bihar, we have 20 operational units of liquefied medical oxygen (LMO) and one air separator unit. On April 15, we have supplied 15 metric tonnes of oxygen while up to 270 metric tonnes per day during peak time,” Mehrotra said adding that they are going to set up 10 pressure swing adsorption (PSA) oxygen generation plant in different sub-divisional hospitals in the state with the help of BIADA.
He said the health department have allocated the land at ten sub-divisional hospitals for the PSA oxygen generation plant and the work order has been given. “These plants will be ready before June-mid. We are also going to set up one air separator unit of 1,500 cylinders on a lease agreement. It will be operational by June-mid.,” Mehrotra said.
Talking about the oxygen policy, the additional chief secretary said the state government would give incentives to high priority sector units, including LMO, medical oxygen generation, storage tank cylinder manufacturing, oxygen concentrators and auxiliary devices, and oxygen logistics units.