More mandis in Punjab to handle procurement due to COVID-19: Capt Amarinder Singh

Punjab Chief Minister Captain Amarinder Singh on Friday said that the State was gearing up to handle another bumper harvest and would be going for district-wise and village-wise procurement and marketing for the rabi crop.

At a video conference with the media, hosted by All India Congress Committee, he said the number of 'mandis' had increased from 1,800 to 3,800 this year in view of the COVID-19 pandemic.

The Chief Minister said that apart from police and district officials, the Guardians of Governance personnel would also man the mandis and NCC volunteers are also likely to pitch in. The procurement will begin from April 15.

On testing, the Chief Minister admitted that the 2,877 tests conducted so far were not enough, given Punjab's population of 2.8 crore.

He admitted that testing was a constraint as only two hospitals in Punjab were given permission to test initially, along with PGIMER in Chandigarh, but one more was now being added along with two private labs.

With 25,000 rapid testing kits also expected to arrive, mass testing in hotpots will begin from Monday, he said.

In the next few days, the Health Department would get more aggressive with testing and random testing will be done in areas of concentration, he said.

While ventilators and masks were sufficient for the present, more had been ordered and would start coming in the next few days, he said.

On personal protective equipment (PPE kits), the Chief Minister said that with two Ludhiana manufacturers getting approval for making such kits, the state would start getting 5000 of them a day from Monday and could provide the excess to other states, with directly or through the Central government.

As for medical staff, he said the retired doctors had volunteered in large numbers and were on standby to help out.

On the contribution of Tablighi Jamaat to the spread of the pandemic in Punjab, the Chief Minister revealed that his government had received a list of 651 who had entered the state, and of these, 636 had so far been traced and 27 found positive (including 10 contacts of these TJ Nizamuddin attendees).

The release said that of the nearly 1.5 lakh NRIs and foreign returnees, the state had traced and quarantined the majority and the quarantine period was over in 33,166 cases of foreign travel.

The Chief Minister said Rs 15,000 crore sanctioned by the Centre for COVID-19 emergency response and health system preparedness package was "absolutely insufficient".

"How can this be enough for the nearly 1.4 billion people of India?" he said.

The Congress leader said that no state has the resources to fight the battle without the help of the central government and it has to come forward to help the states.

The Chief Minister said he will take up the issue of more funds to enable every state to fight the war.

He reiterated the State government's demand for a special economic package to deal with the crisis, pointing out that the Centre had released part of Punjab's pending GST arrears over the past few days but those would barely meet the normal needs of salaries etc.

He stressed the need for the Centre to come forward with financial assistance for combating the COVID-19 crisis, saying it was the responsibility of the Government of India as the States had to ensure food, free rations, shelter and other requirements for poor people.

He said Punjab was taking care of the basic needs of the lakhs of migrant labourers stuck here but even industry could not continue to pay them indefinitely without assistance.

( With inputs from ANI )