The Delhi government on Saturday appointed a bureaucrat in the north corporation the “nodal officer” for LNJP Hospital, a dedicated COVID-19 facility in the national capital, officials said.
The move comes amid LNJP Hospital facing heat from several quarters over a video aired on a private channel showing alleged mismanagement at the facility. Arava Gopi Krishna, a deputy commissioner in the North Delhi Municipal Corporation, has been told to take up his new assignment immediately without waiting for any relieving order from the present place of posting, the order said.
The development come after the Supreme Court on Friday came down heavily on the Delhi government over its handling of dead bodies in hospitals stating it reflected a “very sorry state of affairs” in the national capital amid a spike in Coronavirus cases.
Citing media reports on how bodies lie in hospitals stacked against each other, a three-judge bench of the Supreme Court observed that lack of beds in hospitals is an issue of concern.
“We are shocked by the deplorable manner in which many hospitals have handled COVID-19 patients’ bodies,” the court said during the hearing.