The crisis caused by oxygen shortages due to the massive surge in COVID-19 cases in Delhi appears to be continuing despite declarations from the Centre.
Several times this week, the Delhi government and hospitals in the national capital have claimed the neighbouring states of Haryana and Uttar Pradesh were not allowing movement of oxygen tankers to the NCT. On Thursday afternoon, Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal tweeted he had spoken to his Haryana counterpart, Manohar Lal Khattar, to seek support in facilitating movement of oxygen tankers from Haryana to Delhi. Kejriwal tweeted that Khattar had "assured full support".
Earlier on Thursday, a senior executive of Apollo Hospitals had tweeted the Haryana Police were not allowing an oxygen tanker to refill at an IOCL plant in Panipat. Dr Sangita Reddy, joint managing director of Apollo Hospitals, tweeted at 12.24 pm, "As I tweet, an oxygen tanker is outside the gate of Air Liquide Panipat plant at IOCL and he is not being allowed inside Haryana police are stopping it & not letting the oxygen out of Haryana. Need urgent intervention!!"
Reddy tagged the handles of the Prime Minister's Office, Defence Minister Rajnath Singh and Railway Minister Piyush Goyal among others in her tweet.
Around 15 minutes later, Reddy tweeted that the oxygen tanker had been allowed in. She also appealed to the Centre to designate oxygen tankers as ambulances and enable green corridor movement for them. "Update: The driver has just been allowed inside & hopefully the oxygen will be sent out soon. Further to my earlier tweet an appeal once again to the Govt to please tag oxygen tank as ambulances & enable quick green corridor movement."
By 3pm, Reddy's tweet on the Haryana Police action had been re-tweeted nearly 5,000 times. Kejriwal himself responded to the tweet by Reddy. Kejriwal tweeted, "I urge Central govt and Govt of Haryana to kindly facilitate smooth passage to oxygen vehicles."
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Before tweeting about the oxygen tanker being held up, Reddy had told CNBC-TV 18, “Delhi is in a critical situation, tankers are stuck at the Haryana border. Request the Govt to declare oxygen tankers as ambulances and allow them to move freely.”
The Centre had on Wednesday night increased Delhi's quota of oxygen to 480MT, but the figure was considered inadequate by the state government and hospitals.
