Jailing officers won't bring Oxygen in Delhi: Supreme Court

New Delhi/Mumbai/Srinagar: The Supreme Court on Wednesday stayed contempt proceedings initiated by Delhi High Court against central government officials for non-compliance of direction to supply 700 MT of oxygen for COVID patients here, saying "putting officers in jail" would not bring oxygen and efforts should be made to save lives.

The apex court conducted urgent hearing on the Centre's plea against the high court show-cause notice on contempt and an order seeking personal appearance of its two senior officials for failing to comply with the directions to ensure supply of 700 liquid medical oxygen (LMO) to Delhi.

Seeking the report by Thursday 10.30 am, the bench said it should also indicate the sources of supply of LMO, provision for transportation and "logistical arrangements necessary".

Three people including a 30-year-old woman and two men aged 40 and 42 years, died in an ambulance while undergoing treatment for Covid at the Salem Government Mohan Kumaramangalam Memorial Medical College Hospital.

As many as seven Covid-19 patients reportedly died due to shortage of the life-saving gas in Kalaburagi and Belagavi.

Five patients died at a private hospital in Uttarakhand's Roorkee reportedly after the facility ran out of medical oxygen for 30 minutes.

According to a doctor working at the facility, the hospital's medical oxygen supply was disrupted between 1.30 am to 2 am. While one of the deceased was on ventilator support, the other four patients were dependent on medical oxygen supply, the doctor said adding that one the deceased was a woman.

BJP MP Dr Subramanian Swamy tweeted: 'India will survive pandemic as it did Islamic invaders and British imperialists. We could face one more wave that targets children unless strict precautions now are taken. Modi should therefore delegate the conduct of this war to Gadkari."

Covid crisis continued to claim lives in Jammu and Kashmir as 38 deaths were reported in 15 hours, taking the total number of pandemic-related deaths to 2,496.

India registered 382,315 fresh cases of coronavirus disease in the preceding 24 hours, pushing the nationwide infection tally past 20.66 million. 3,780 new fatalities were recorded in the same duration, mounting the country's Covid-19 death toll to 226,188.