AAP vs Centre: Delhi deputy CM Manish Sisodia lashes out at BJP over report on ‘exaggerated oxygen need’
Delhi deputy chief minister Manish Sisodia on Friday lashed out at the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) and said it was lying about a report which has said the Arvind Kejriwal-led state government exaggerated the city's oxygen demand during the devastating second wave of coronavirus pandemic in April-May.
FollowThe Delhi government on Friday said that the members of the Supreme Court’s oxygen audit committee have “not signed or approved” the interim report that has found that the national capital “inflated” its medical oxygen needs during the peak of the second wave.
A report set off a new clash between the Centre and Arvind Kejriwal's Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) government, however, AAP insists there is no such report and the claim is part of "malicious and false" propaganda.
The senior Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) leader also challenged the BJP leaders to present the report on the oxygen audit in Delhi that has been approved and signed by the Supreme Court's oxygen audit panel.
"Oxygen Audit Report DOES NOT EXIST. SC Oxygen Audit Committee has not signed any such report. BJP is sharing a Fake Report made in their party headquarters. I challenge BJP to produce the report signed by SC Oxygen audit committee," the deputy chief minister said in a tweet.
Addressing a webcast, Deputy Chief Minister Manish Sisodia said that the report “being shared by the BJP was drafted at its party headquarters”. The interim report prepared by the SC panel has already been submitted to the apex court.
“One purported report is being quoted as having said that Delhi’s oxygen demand was inflated. There is no such report. The report being shared by the BJP does not exist at all. They are lying. The members of the panel we spoke to are saying that they have not signed or approved any report. The matter is sub-judice and one should not play politics over issues that are in court,” Sisodia said.
"It was discussed that there is a gross discrepancy (about 4 times) in that the actual oxygen consumption claimed (1140MT) was about 4 times higher than the versus calculated consumption by formula for bed capacity (289MT)," says the interim report of a sub-group, which the Centre has submitted to the Supreme Court along with recommendations of a National Task Force on oxygen.
The sub-group, led by AIIMS Director Randeep Guleria, includes Delhi Government Principal Home Secretary Bhupinder Bhalla, Max Healthcare Director Sandeep Buddhiraja, Union Jal Shakti Ministry Joint Secretary Subodh Yadav and Sanjay Kumar Singh of the Petroleum and Oxygen Safety Organization (PESO).
By doing this, the BJP is not abusing Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal, but "those who lost their family members due to oxygen shortage when coronavirus cases were at its peak, Sisodia said and accused the Union government of mismanagement "which led to the oxygen crisis".
Delhi was hit severely by a brutal second wave of the Covid-19 pandemic in April and May, claiming a massive number of lives daily, with a shortage in oxygen supply at various city hospitals adding to the woes.
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