The court directed that Delhi government 663 additional ICU beds be put in place by next week
The Delhi High Court on Thursday questioned the AAP government for relaxing the restriction on public movement and gathering and not putting its house in order despite anticipating in September itself that the number of COVID-19 cases would rise in the national capital during the festival season.
The high court also said that even the sero survey report of that month had anticipated the increase in cases.
"You (Delhi government) should have put your house in order. You knew Delhi gets worse during this period due to the air pollution. You knew the cold wave along with the rise in air pollution would be a problem for those having breathing problems.
"You knew it was a cocktail of death for those living in Delhi. You knew which way the cases would go in Delhi," said a bench of Justices Hima Kohli and Subramonium Prasad.
The bench said the Delhi government had anticipated in September itself that cases would rise in October-November during the festive season as it had decided to increase the number of ICU beds to cater to the expected rise in COVID-19 numbers.
It added that in such a scenario the Delhi government opened up market places and allowed public transportation to run at full capacity.
The court said that had the Delhi government roped in the market associations and the resident welfare associations right at the start, it would have been possible to prevent marketplaces becoming chock-a-block.
The observations by the bench came during the hearing of a PIL by advocate Rakesh Malhotra seeking increase in the COVID-19 testing numbers in the national capital and getting speedy results.
During the hearing, Delhi government said it was alive to the situation and was in the process of augmenting its hospitals'' ICU beds by an additional 663 beds.
It also told the court that the central government has offered to pitch in with an additional 750 ICU beds of which 250 would be available next week.
It said that it has more than 50 per cent of its capacity of normal COVID beds in government hospitals and it was the ICU beds which it was apprehensive of running out.
The court directed that the 663 additional ICU beds be put in place by next week and also ordered the Delhi government to publicise on its website as well as in news media the requisition of 80 per cent ICU beds in 33 hospitals, so that people would know where to go.