Central team on COVID-19 claims lack of cooperation by Mamata govt

Kolkata, Apr 21 () A day after West Bengal ChiefMinister Mamata Banerjee claimed she was kept in "dark" aboutthe visit of central teams to assess the COVID-19 situation,the leader of one of the panels claimed the state governmentis not extending adequate cooperation.

The central government has constituted six Inter-Ministerial Central Teams (IMCTs) to make an on-spotassessment of the COVID-19 situation in these places and issuenecessary directions to the four states -- Madhya Pradesh,Maharashtra, Rajasthan and West Bengal -- for redress.

The Union home ministry said on Monday morning theCOVID-19 situation is "especially serious" in Mumbai, Pune,Indore, Jaipur, Kolkata and a few other places in West Bengal,and that the violation of lockdown measures risk the spread ofthe novel coronavirus.

Apurva Chandra, the leader of one of the two teamssent to the state, claimed its members were told they "willnot be going out" on Tuesday.

Chandra, an Additional secretary in the DefenceMinistry, said,"We have been deployed by the centralgovernment and our order of deployment says that the stategovernment is to provide logistic(al) support to us... I havebeen in touch with the chief secretary and seeking his supportsince the time I landed here.

"I had also met him yesterday. But today we have beeninformed that there are some issues so we are not going outtoday. The chief secretary is likely to visit us and we willagain hold a meeting with him," he told a TV news channel.

Chandra said the team had made it clear that it wouldbe moving out with state government officers in order to makethe visit more productive.

"But now it is more than one day and we have onlyvisited NICED (an ICMR facility) and the state secretariatonly," he said.

Banerjee had on Monday expressed her displeasure in aseries of tweets and sought to know the rationale behind theformation of central teams to visit the states.

She urged Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Union HomeMinister Amit Shah to share with her the criteria to befollowed by the teams for the assessment of the situation,without which her government "would not be able to moveahead". PNT MM SKSK SK