Masks, sanitisers out of essentials’ list
SHORTAGE OVERCOME, NO FURTHER NEED TO INCLUDE THE PRODUCTS UNDER ESSENTIAL COMMODITIES ACT, SAID GOVERNMENT OFFICIALS
NEW DELHI: The Centre has removed masks and sanitisers from the purview of the Essential Commodities Act, citing the absence of reports of shortages of such items from anywhere in the country. The items were brought under the purview of this law in March when demand for them outstripped supply, with an eye on capping prices. Masks and sanitisers remain the first line of defence to prevent the spread of the coronavirus disease.
“There are no adverse reports with respect to price or availability to continue (to treat) face masks and hand sanitisers as essential commodities,” a Union consumer affairs ministry order said last week.
Since late March companies have significantly increased production of sanitisers and several have also entered these businesses. The emergence of twoand three-play cloth masks as adequate protection (as opposed to the N95 masks that people thought were the only protection in March) has also played a role in ensuing adequate supply.
Officials allayed fears that the move may lead to a spike in prices citing their adequate supply. “Usually retail prices go up when there is more demand than supply. A few months ago, there was a shortage of these items, which is why they were brought under the Act... Now there is indigenous manufacturing also of these items. We are comfortably placed, and experts reviewing the matter did not find the need to continue the restrictions,” said an official in the pharmaceuticals department , who asked not to be named.
Officials said the supply of personal protection equipment, including masks, and hand sanitisers, has now been streamlined at hospitals too.
“There was a shortage a few months ago but now these are readily available, and even the prices have come down,” said a person associated with Max Healthcare, which runs a chain of hospitals.
The production and supply of masks and hand sanitisers were regulated as per the law and various states put price caps on them. Hoarding of any item declared as an essential commodity is an offence under the Act and can lead to imprisonment of up to seven years.
A second official in the pharmaceuticals department said a frequent review of these items in all states and Union Territories showed that supply is enough to meet demand. “Therefore, no shortage is anticipated. The government will continue to monitor the prices of these commodities under regular channels.”
The Directorate General of Foreign Trade on March 20 banned exports of masks, textile raw material used for making them, and ventilators in view of the pandemic. The order denotifying masks and sanitisers as essential items will have no bearing on the export ban, the second official said. That means they can’t be exported.
On June 29, the restricted export of PPE kits was allowed by the Directorate General of Foreign Trade. A monthly quota of five million PPE for Covid-19 units has been fixed, for issuance of export licences.
Abhishek Aggrawal, an analyst with commodities trading firm Comtrade, said that if supply is equal to or more than demand, then there is no legal justification for treating any item as essential. “The original notification declaring these items as essential was till June-end.”
“Even after four months of the pandemic, we are still not getting adequate number of sanitisers in our hospitals and clinics. With this new rule, the essential materials will once again be sold at a higher price, which will add to to the ongoing the crisis and patient bills. Unless these items are easily available in chemist stores at reasonable rates, its removal from the list of essential items is not the right step,” said Dr Deepak Baid, president, Association of Medical Consultants, Mumbai.
LUCKNOW: Shortly after Prime Minister Narendra Modi announced the 21-day nationwide lockdown to fight the Covid-19 pandemic in March, Sanjay Singh, a 45-year-old resident of Mirzapur village in Jalaun district realised that there was a crisis in the making.
Jalaun lies in the plains of Bundelkhand, a region from where several thousand men and women migrate to Mumbai in Maharashtra, Surat and Ahmedabad in Gujarat, Bengaluru in Karnataka and other metropolises, in search of work. When the lockdown began on March 25, Singh saw residents of nearby villages make frantic calls to their family members living as migrants in big cities, fearful of their survival. Within a few days, one of the country’s biggest reverse migration movements began, as migrant workers took to the roads, often on foot, to go back to their home states.
Towards the end of March, such a group of migrant workers had reached Madhya Pradesh’s Datia district, but to enter their home state, permissions from top officials like the chief secretary and additional chief secretary (Home) in Lucknow were required. In the meantime, the police had a tough task controlling the workers who were impatient to cross into Uttar Pradesh. It was also an arduous task for the administration of districts to supply food and water.
That’s when Singh, who runs a voluntary organisation called Parmarth Samaj Sewi Sansthan which works on livelihood and