Centre sends 4 monitoring teams to Gujarat, Telangana, Tamil Nadu

Tribune News Service
New Delhi, April 24

The Centre today constituted four new Inter-Ministerial Central Teams (IMCTs) under the leadership of Additional Secretary-level officers and sent them to monitor the Covid-19 situation in Gujarat, Telangana and Tamil Nadu.

‘Incident Commanders’ for Indore

New Delhi: Finding that Indore district has 170 Covid hotspots and their containment zones, the Inter-Ministerial Central Team, headed by Additional Secretary Abhilaksh Likhi, has directed the local administration to deploy senior officials as ‘Incident Commanders’ in 21 critical hotspots and their containment zones. TNS

Punya Salila Srivatava, Joint Secretary in the Ministry of Home Affairs (MHA), said these teams would visit Ahmedabad and Surat in Gujarat, Hyderabad in Telangana and Chennai in Tamil Nadu.

Briefing mediapersons here on government’s move, the MHA official said the teams were in addition to six IMCTs constituted earlier and sent to states, including West Bengal, Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan and Maharashtra. The teams were already reviewing the implementation of the lockdown measures in view of the pandemic after making ground assessment of the situation.

The teams comprise public health specialists and officials of the National Disaster Management Authority, whose expertise can be leveraged by the state government for the management of the pandemic.

The teams have been deputed under the authority conferred on the Centre under Section 35 of the Disaster Management Act, 2005, which states that “the Centre shall take all such measures deemed necessary or expedient for the purpose of disaster management”.

Meanwhile, in a separate statement, the Ministry of Home Affairs said the Covid-19 situation was especially serious in major or emerging hotspot areas, including Ahmedabad, Surat, Hyderabad and Chennai. It said violations of lockdown measures reported in some parts of the country posed a serious health hazard to public and might lead to further spread.

"The situation is especially serious in major hotspot districts or emerging hotspots like Ahmedabad and Surat (Gujarat), Thane (Maharashtra), Hyderabad (Telangana), and Chennai (Tamil Nadu)," the statement read.

Provide record of patients, West Bengal told

New Delhi: Based on the interaction he had with West Bengal Government officials, Additional Secretary Apurva Chandra, who leads the IMCT in the state, has asked the Chief Secretary to clarify on a host of issues relating to its preparedness and handling of Covid cases. In its letter to the West Bengal Chief Secretary, the IMCT has sought interaction with the committee of doctors appointed by the state government to declare cause of death of Covid positive patients. “The IMCT seeks case records of all Covid patients where cause of death is attributed to some other reason by the committee and also the time taken by it in coming to its conclusion,” Chandra said in the letter. The team has also asked the state government to clarify if such a committee to ascertain cause of death existed for any other disease in the state and whether such a committee was in line with ICMR guidelines. TNS