Frame Exhaustive Guidelines For Oxygen Supply And Management : Karnataka High Court Directs State Govt

A division bench of Chief Justice Abhay Oka and Justice Aravind Kumar noted that "Draft has been placed by AAG, he candidly accepted that as of today there are no written guidelines available for supply of Oxygen and Oxygen management. He submits that the state will issue exhaustive guidelines, government and private hospitals exclusively dealing with Oxygen."

During the hearing the bench orally remarked "This is the situation till now we don't have any guidelines. The cases have reached 50,000 in the state." Accordingly, it said the guidelines should be ready at the earliest. The AAG informed the court that it would be done before the next date of hearing. The court said "The person who is going to draft the protocol for procuring oxygen, at district and taluk levels let him put himself in that position."

The court also directed the state government to give wide publicity to the helpline no created for hospitals to contact for procuring Oxygen supply. The court said "We direct the state government to ensure that information about helpline numbers is available to each and every hospital which is admitting covid patients. Commissioners and Deputy commissioners are directed to communicate the helpline numbers. This exercise shall be carried out immediately. Even guidelines framed by the government for optimum use of Oxygen, shall be made available across the state to all hospitals."

The bench also noted that Centralised data of bottling plants in state and capacity of bottling plants, availability of oxygen, has not been created. Even centralised data of various districts and taluks is not available. It directed "The War room created for effective management of Oxygen shall be provided with the centralised data. The state shall take immediate steps on this behalf."

The court also recorded the submission made by the Advocate General Prabhuling K Navadgi that as regards additional quota of 100 MT made available to the state from May 1. The state is allowed to lift 60 MT per day from a unit at Bellary and 40 MT, from Orissa. He stated that five empty containers have been sent by air having capacity of 74 MT each to Orissa. Further, he stated that the government of India has allotted 20 MT tonnes each from the aid received from Bahrain and Oman.

Further the court informed 28 PSA units will be set up in the state as sanctioned by the Central government. The State government has also placed an order for procuring another 40 PSA units, most of which will be operational by end of this month. The court also noted that the state government had made a representation to the Central Government for allowing to lift Oxygen manufactured in the state.