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A resident of Bhubaneswar, Odisha's Capital city, has brought serious allegations against the local civic authorities of 'offering' Covid death compensation to him even though there has been no case of demise in his family.
Such a shocking incident has come to the fore, a day after the Supreme Court (SC) rapped the State governments including Odisha citing official reports of Covid deaths are less than the real toll of fatalities so there should not any denial of ex-gratia.
As claimed by Saswat Devdutt, a Bhubaneswar resident from Chandrasekharpur area, on February 3 he received a phone call from a person who identified himself to be an official of Bhubaneswar Municipal Corporation. The officer asked him to collect Rs 50, 000 as ex-gratia amount for the death of his relative (as per government reports).
The next day, Saswat alleges that he received another caller citing him to be Revenue Inspector (RI) of Kalarahanga who again asked him to collect the government's financial aid.
"I and my family members were taken aback after receiving such phone calls, as my mother is alive. However, I decided to share about the incident on Twitter," said Saswat.
When inquired over the matter, the BMC official and RI admitted of such frequent blunders from their side but further clarified that the calls made were based on the list of Covid deaths received from the hospitals.
"As per our procedure, we first demand the list of Covid deaths from the hospital. Then the calls are made based on the contact details and other relevant information mentioned in the list. We call the beneficiaries for all necessary document verification before releasing ex-gratia," said the RI.
The RI further added that this is not an isolated case but the authorities have received the contact numbers of alive persons through the list on multiple occasions. "The BMC shortlists the contact details and other information of the deceased and beneficiaries according to the zones and conducts the verification process along with the Tehsil office," the RI said adding that the BMC can better clarify about the errors."
On the other hand, a BMC official said, "We make the calls for verification based on the list received from the Tehsil office. The hospitals provide the list and accordingly, we carry out the process. We download the list from Tehsil office's website."
