Senior Trinamul leader Gautam Deb, who chairs the board of administrators of the Siliguri Municipal Corporation (SMC), on Saturday held a meeting with officials of the Darjeeling district administration, district health department and Siliguri Metropolitan Police to take stock of the vaccination process underway in the city and subdivision as a whole.
Deb’s move follows recent protests at the district hospital here in Siliguri and in Bagdogra where people had alleged the influence of brokers in the vaccination process, as well as the recent fake vaccination case in Calcutta, said a health official.
District magistrate S. Ponnambalam, police commissioner Gaurav Sharma and chief medical officer (health) Pralay Acharya were present in the meeting along with representatives of North Bengal Medical College and Hospital and Siliguri district hospital.
“We discussed in detail the current Covid situation of the city and vaccination process. Though the number of cases have started going down lately, we need to take it to the baseline. I have heard that a racket of brokers is active in NBMCH. From now on, there will be inspector level officers monitoring activities there, right from treatment to vaccination,” said Deb. “Our target is to vaccinate every resident of Siliguri civic area.”
He also said that officers of deputy commissioner of police rank will regularly visit all vaccination centres to root out any anomaly in the process.
As of now, around 1,400 doses of vaccines are administered to people through 10 urban primary health centres. Also, another 500-odd vaccine doses are provided from NBMCH and Siliguri district hospital.
Acharya said they have also discussed the surveillance of vaccination camps. “Without permission from appropriate authorities, no one will be able to organise any such camp,” he said.
Sikkim lockdown
The state government of Sikkim on Saturday issued a notification, extending the ongoing pandemic-induced lockdown in the state, which was supposed to end on Monday, till July 5.
However, with decline in the number of daily Covid-19 infections, the Sikkim government has decided to allow some relaxations from Monday. Movement of public transport between districts of the state will be allowed but vehicles will run on alternate days, based on “odd-even” registration numbers. From Monday, bars and restaurants will stay open till 10pm, with 50 per cent seating capacity, sources added.
Additional reporting by Rajeev Ravidas