COVID-19: Rahul Gandhi urges PM to take action against ‘profiteering’ in test kits procurement
Congress alleges kits imported for Rs245 a piece being bought for Rs600
New Delhi: Congress leader Rahul Gandhi on Monday demanded Prime Minister Narendra Modi to take strict action against the alleged profiteering in coronavirus rapid test kits procurement.
“Even when the entire country is fighting COVID-19, some people do not miss out on making unfair profits. Shame, disgust at this corrupt mentality. We demand from the Prime Minister that strictest action should be taken on these profiteers soon,” Gandhi tweeted in Hindi.
He said that the country will “never forgive” those making an unfair profit by selling testing kits.
Earlier in the day, Congress leader Ahmed Patel had targeted the federal government over antibody test kits being purchased for Rs600 per piece by the ICMR, which were being imported for Rs245 each.
Delhi High Court had on Sunday directed that COVID-19 related tests should be made available to the general public at the lowest cost possible as the country is going through an unprecedented medical crisis affecting public order.
“The country is going through an unprecedented medical crisis affecting public order. People have been cloistered in their homes or constrained to stay wherever they were on March 24.
The Congress on Monday demanded that the government should make public details of all purchases made in the last one month to fight COVID-19, alleging that huge profiteering was being made at this time of crisis.
Congress spokesperson Manish Tewari said the government should ensure that huge profiteering in procurement of equipment for fighting COVID-19 be stopped immediately.
“There seems to be absolute anarchy in procurement of equipment for fighting COVID-19,” he said at a press conference via video conferencing.
“We would like to demand from the Health Ministry and the government to make public all procurements made with regard to equipment to fight COVID-19 for testing, PPEs and ventilators. All those transactions must be transparently placed in public domain,” he said.
Referring to a company engaged in supply of testing kits, he alleged that kits purchased at Rs245 were being sold by the same company to ICMR at Rs600 each while the same to Tamil Nadu government were sold at Rs400 each.
He said the matter came to light in a petition before the Delhi High Court by a company supplying such equipment.
“This is an extremely serious matter which hurts the fight of India against COVID-19,” he said, adding, that “our country’s resources are scarce and we have to optimise the resources and not allow companies to make arbitrage of over 60 per cent in these transactions.”