Mohd Aasif I Clarion India
NEW DELHI – The Congress started a spirited campaign against the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) led NDA government at the Centre on Twitter on Monday this week. The party cornered the government the alleged PM CARES ventilator scam with hashtag #PMVentilatorScam trending on second position internationally for almost the entire day.
The PM CARES fund has been on the radar of the intelligentsia of the country for quite some time. With the PMO declining to reply to the questions raised in an RTI on the newly established fund during the pandemic doubts were raised on its credentials. Criticism of the government over the fund intensified after it was declared as ‘not public’ authority even though the fund was constituted by a government circular and all the constitutional institutions and their employees were asked to contribute to it.
The campaign against the government gathered momentum after the authorities claimed that the PM CARES Fund will be used to provide ventilators for patients suffering with Coronavirus Covid-19. BJP chief JP Nadda had promised 6,000 ventilators by the end of the June, but the government delivered only 1,340 ventilators till June 23.
PM-Cares is not BJP’s private fund, it is money collected from the public and should be subject to all levels of transparency.#PMVentilatorScam pic.twitter.com/Y56DEPNLka
— Congress (@INCIndia) July 6, 2020
The official twitter handle of Indian National Congress (INC) writes, “PM-Cares is not BJP’s private fund, it is money collected from the public and should be subject to all levels of transparency.”
On March 31, the government ordered 40,000 ventilators. Thereafter, the PM Cares fund allocated Rs 2,000 crore procurement of 50,000 ventilators. The Congress asked if the second order included the first 40,000 ventilators.
Why were u openly lying to the people, @JPNadda?
U claimed 60,000 ventilators by June-end. Only 1340 delivered.
U were the Health Minister under Modi 1.0.
Do u know many innocent lives are in danger because of ur utter shamelessness?
Kitna $$ kamaaya?#PMVentilatorScam pic.twitter.com/nzQ5vgBs8l
— Saket Gokhale (@SaketGokhale) July 6, 2020
The allegation of not following proper procedure for the procurement of ventilators holds water as The Pioneer reported that the CCMV designed and built by Skanray making use of the Bharat Electricals Ltd (BEL) technology succeeded in bringing down the cost considerably. Dr Jagadish J Hiremath, MD in anesthesiology was quoted as saying, “This ventilator costs less than a lakh rupees.”
The government’s claim it had spent Rs 4 lakh on each ventilator contradicts the AgVa company statement that its ventilator costs 1.5 lakh. The question arises where did the remaining 1,500 crore has gone. Former foreign correspondent, Saket Gokhale, writes, “PM CARES claims to have spent 2,000 crore on 50,000 ventilators (i.e. 4 lakh/ventilator). While the above statement by Dr Hiremath shows they together should’ve cost less than 500 crore (at a price of less than 1 lakh/ventilator) where did 1,500 crore go?”
The government should come clean on the matter.
