At a time when the Indian National Congress and Rahul Gandhi are attacking the Central government daily as they claim that the situation of the country would have been much better if the Congress would be at the helm, the Congress-led Rajasthan government is serving everyday lessons in how not to manage a pandemic. The Ashok Gehlot government, fresh after leasing the ventilators allotted to Rajasthan under the ambit of PMCares to private hospitals, has now reportedly wasted a whopping 11.5 lakh doses of the vaccine against the Wuhan coronavirus.
Finally, a Congress-ruled state has managed to emerge as the numero uno, albeit in the wastage of vaccines. According to reports, Rajasthan is comfortably leading the vaccine wastage race with a total of 11.5 lakh which amounts to 7 per cent vaccine doses that have been wasted in the Congress-ruled state.
The numbers coming in from Rajasthan’s districts are startling, to say the least, with the district of Churu reporting the highest loss of vaccine at 39.7 per cent. Churu is followed by Hanumagarh with 24.60 per cent, Bharatpur at 17.13 per cent and Kota at 16.71 per cent vaccine wastage.
Union Minister Gajendra Shekhawat who defeated Ashok Gehlot’s son from Jodhpur in the 2019 LS elections while lambasting the Rajasthan government said, “PM Modi has been repeatedly saying that wasting a dose of covid vaccine is like depriving a person of life cover, but how will he improve those who have become used to playing with people’s lives?”
Imagine almost 40 per cent of vaccine doses being wasted in a city. The vaccination drive is as much about effectively administering and allocating the limited number of doses as it is about procuring the necessary doses. It won’t be surprising if the Ashok Gehlot government soon cries about vaccine shortage and attacks the Modi government for not allocating enough vaccines to the Rajasthan.
Recently, an appalling development had come to light from Rajasthan, where life-support ventilators belonging to the PM Cares Fund pool were being leased out by government hospitals to private institutes for exorbitant rates – the burden of which unsuspecting patients are having to incur.
According to a report by Republic World, Bharatpur’s Rai Bahadur hospital has leased 20 of its ventilators provided by PM-CARES Fund to Jindal private hospital, citing ‘non-usage’ of the equipment. The development has exposed the Ashok Gehlot-led government of Rajasthan, as it allows the leasing of ventilators belonging to the central pool to private hospitals in the state.
Aggrieved kin quoted by Republic said, “40 ventilators were provided by the PM-CARES fund. I have been asking hospital administration for the past 2 months, where have the ventilators been installed? But they have no answers. Jindal hospital which has always been in controversy has been given 10 ventilators by hospital administration. Collector says that the ventilators were faulty, but they were not. Jindal hospital has been charging Rs 35,000-40,000 for these ventilators.”
Meanwhile, Rai Bahadur Hospital’s administrator shamelessly went on to defend the institute’s move to lease ventilators to Jindal Hospital. He said, “20 ventilators have been kept at non-COVID ICU wards, while 20 have been kept for COVID ICU wards. As per our oxygen point availability and caseload, we were not able to utilise 20 ventilators. Hence, we took a conscious decision to give it to a private hospital on cost.”
The Ashok Gehlot government in Rajasthan stands as a shining example of what would have been the condition of India if Congress were at the helm at this crucial juncture.