According to The Times of India, police in Uttar Pradesh have filed a first information report against the former head of a village for allegedly making false claims to the media about the coronavirus and spreading rumours to tarnish the government’s reputation.
The Times of India and The Wire published on Covid-19 patients in Gewla Gopalgarh village lying on cots beneath a neem tree, with glucose drips hanging from the branches. They were having difficulty finding hospital beds and thought that being under the tree would help increase their oxygen levels.
Yogesh Talan, the former village head, told The Wire that a large number of residents had become ill after Uttar Pradesh’s panchayat elections last month. He was quoted by the website as saying, “There isn’t a single house where nobody has a cough or fever.” The government has performed miserably on two fronts: research and medical care for the ill. In this village, people are feeling powerless.
According to Talan, hospitals are refusing to accept even patients with serious symptoms.
According to The Times of India, the administration of Gautam Buddh Nagar, under whose jurisdiction the village is, declared that it had organised two coronavirus research camps in the village beginning on May 13. Officials said that Talan failed to provide the villagers with accurate information about the drive.
Harveer Talan, a 65-year-old villager, is also being investigated by the administration. He was accused of denying admission to a Covid-care facility despite the fact that a bed had been reserved for him, and the administration alleged he had been consulting quacks. Officials also said that Yogesh Talan brainwashed Harveer Talan and persuaded his family not to take him to the hospital even though his oxygen saturation levels were dropping.
According to The Times of India, Yogesh Talan was charged under Sections 188 (disobedience to an order properly promulgated by a public servant), 269 and 270 (act likely to spread the infection) of the Indian Penal Code, as well as sections of the Epidemic Diseases Act. The complaint, filed by the Jewar Primary Health Centre, did not name Harveer Talan as an accused.
Several reports have emerged about Uttar Pradesh’s collapsing healthcare system, in the midst of the country’s massive second wave of the coronavirus.
On Monday, the Allahabad High Court criticised the state of the medical system in Uttar Pradesh’s small towns and villages, claiming it was at the mercy of God.
In addition, thousands of corpses of suspected coronavirus patients have been discovered floating in the Ganga river or buried along river banks in the district, as well as Bihar and Madhya Pradesh, in recent weeks.
Despite criticism of his administration’s handling of the health crisis, Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath said on Sunday that the state was ready to deal with the third wave of the coronavirus pandemic “if and when it comes.”
The state government had previously threatened legal action against those who were “spreading rumours” about its Covid mismanagement and had filed lawsuits in several cases.
