HC blames authorities for dengue deaths in the Capital

New Delhi, Oct 17 (UNI) Severely indicting the Centre, Delhi Government and the civic bodies, the Delhi High Court today said had the authorities taken preventive steps, 35 precious lives would not have been lost to dengue epidemic in the Capital.

A division bench of acting Chief Justice Vijender Jain and Justice Kailash Gambhir observed, ''Authorities would be responsible for the deaths in the Capital.'' The Court said it was not satisfied with the affidavit which was submitted before the court on the steps taken to treat the patients admitted to various hospitals and preventive measures intitiated in this regard.

''The authorities had waken up only after notice was served on them on the PIL,'' said the Court.

The Cabinet Secretary convened the meeting on October 7 to initiate the preventive measures only after the court took cognizance of the matter, said the Judges.

''There are hundreds of authorities in the capital and everybody is passing the buck to the other,'' said the court.

The Judges asked the authorities to give the breakup of the expenditure of Rs 91 crore spent on preventive measures in the last one year.

''In spite of repeated pronouncements by this court after taking suo motu cognizance in 1996, we do not comprehand why effective measures to prevent the outbreak of dengue were not taken,'' said the bench seriously castigating the authorities.

The court also asked the Centre to submit the details including the allocation of the funds on the Central Coordination Committee constituted to combat the epidemic.

Whether Rs 1370 crore sanctioned by the govenment to prevent recurrence of dengue, was spent in right earnest or not? the court sought details spendings on the projects.

UNI PAT SY BD1907