Don’t cite global tender and cut vax quota: HC to Centre

CHENNAI: Observing that the situation in Tamil Nadu is under control with the rate of infection reducing in the last few days, the High Court on Thursday sought the Centre to restrain from the quota of jab allocation to the State even if it has decided to opt for a global tender to procure the vaccines.

The first bench comprising Chief Justice Sanjib Banerjee and Justice Senthilkumar Ramamoorthy made the observation during the suo-motu hearing to monitor the State’s preparedness in handling the second wave. “There is a shortage of vaccines and though a decision has been taken to call for a global tender, the allocation otherwise to be made by the Centre to this State should not be diverted, particularly as it may be a longdrawn process, ” Chief Justice Banerjee stressed while noting, “As and when the global tender matures and supplies are received, TN’s allocation by the Centre may be appropriately reworked.”

Observing that while the daily caseload in TN has crossed 30,000, the rate of increase appears to be dropping over the last six days or so, the Chief Justice said, “Oxygen supply to the State has been augmented to 519 MT per day, but the supply of 40 MT from Palakkad to the southern and western districts may have been stopped from today (Thursday) and that may be an area of concern since it may be logistically difficult to effect supply to the southern districts from the units near Chennai.”

But following Additional Solicitor General R Sankaranarayanan’s submission that oxygen is arriving from Odisha by Thursday night, the bench held, “It is possible that additional supply may be coming in from another State, as indicated by the ASG, to make good the loss of supply from Kerala. Overall, there does not appear to be a great dearth of oxygen in the State at the moment.” The plea was posted to May 17 to take further stock of the situation.

With O2 arriving from Odisha, the bench held there does not seem to be dearth in the State now