In an unprecedented development, Bihar Health Minister Mangal Pandey lodged a complaint of the Principal Secretary Health, Government of Bihar Uday Singh Kumawat, that too in the presence of Bihar CM Nitish Kumar and all the Cabinet Ministers during the course of the cabinet meeting.

Mangal Pandey, who was sitting next to Nitish Kumar during the meeting, openly took on Uday Singh Kumawat and said, “The officer doesn’t listen to him and only does what he wants to.” On this Uday Singh Kumawat through a video conference said, “I have to say something.”

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On this Bihar CM reprimanded the Principal Secretary and told him that “every day at least twenty thousand RTPCR tests should be done else I will take action. If you cannot handle the department, please leave it. If Delhi can conduct Thirty-eight thousand tests every day than why can’t Bihar. At the block level, there should be 100-bed Hospital and the hospital should have proper oxygen facilities so that patients could be treated in their district and the burden on Patna could be less.”

Nitish Kumar further added, “In the past 14 years of my government I have never faced a situation like this. Testing should be increased else I will take action. I will soon review the Health Department and will not spare the people who are indulging in wrong practices.”

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Uday Singh Kumawat has been in the eye of controversy ever since he joined the Health Department two months back. There were complaints against him that he would not pick calls from officials of the Health Department and not even meet anyone in his chamber.

Bihar’s COVID crisis

Despite the number of positive cases on the rise in Bihar, Bihar is lagging behind in conducting tests. Now this showdown between the Health Minister and Health Secretary doesn’t augur well for Bihar. Earlier, Health secretary and 90 Batch IAS officer Sanjay Kumar was unceremoniously removed from the post. 

Of late there has been a sharp rise in the number of positive cases in Bihar with new cases being reported in the past 24 hours. So far 36314positive cases have been reported in Bihar out of which 24520 cases have recovered and there are 11561active cases. The recovery rate of Bihar is 67.52 per cent. So far 232 people have died due to Coronavirus in Bihar.

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