Arrests in Delhi over posters critical of Modi trigger political war of words
Opposition parties on Sunday targeted the BJP over police action against at least 25 people in Delhi for putting up posters that were critical of the Prime Minister and the central government on their handling of the country’s Covid-19 vaccination drive.
Senior Congress leader Rahul Gandhi on Sunday shared a digital copy of the poster on his Twitter account and said: “Arrest me too”.
Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) leader Durgesh Pathak also dared the Centre to arrest him and said that AAP workers had put up the posters across the city.
Around 1,800 posters, which said “Modi ji, why did you send vaccines meant for our children abroad?” were found in east Delhi’s Kalyanpuri between Wednesday and Thursday. Delhi Police on Sunday said AAP workers were behind the incident and that 25 people had been arrested under the Delhi Disaster Management Act, the Indian Penal Code and the Prevention of Defacement of Property Act.
GHAZIABAD: Anticipating another wave of the Covid-19 pandemic, the Ghaziabad administration has planned to set up paediatric intensive care units (PICU) wards, having five beds each, in both private and government hospitals for treatment of children.
According to official records from the district health department, about 677 children upto the age of 10 were infected with Covid-19 between April 1 to May 13 this year.
While reviewing the situation, Senthil Pandian C, the UP government-appointed nodal officer, and gave directions to hospitals to come up with such wards.
“The paediatric ICU wards will come up in major private and government hospitals, with five beds each, that will be reserved for the treatment of children who require admission, in case they get infected,” said Pandian.
The two hospitals on the list include Sanjay Nagar Combined District Hospital and the governmentacquired Santosh Medical College in Ghaziabad.
According to state control room figures, the number of active cases stood at 309 on March 31 in Ghaziabad, which spiked to 6,645 on April 30. As on May 15, there were 4,320 active cases. “One of the major factors that has helped bring cases under control is starting early treatment and distributing a medical kit, containing essential medicines required in Covid-19 treatment, free of cost. About 60,000 medical kits have been distributed so far. We are also taking other initiatives to control the infection in the rural areas,” said Ghaziabad district magistrate Ajay Shankar Pandey, said Sunday.
The kit distribution initiative, which started on April 27, sees around 5,000 kits being disbursed per day on an average.
It contains a prescription, along with medicines for patients having symptoms and also for those staying in homeisolation. The admin has also decided to open up cylinder refilling at Dasna, Loni, Modinagar, Muradnagar and Khoda.
“Similar facilities, each equipped to refill 25-30 cylinders, will also come up at the local body offices at Dasna, Loni, Muradnagar and Khoda. We have also decided to open referral facilities at Muradnagar, Loni, Dasna and Modinagar with 25-30 beds in the first batch. The facilities will be made operational in the two to three days,” said Krishna Karunesh, officiating DM, had said Friday.