40,000 Covid-related corruption complaints received by Centre

The Centre has received nearly 40,000 complaints dealing with corruption related to Covid-19.

In April this year, the government had set up a separate portal to expeditiously address complaints related to coronavirus pandemic and has received over 167,000 complaints so far. Of this over 150,000 have been addressed. The complaints have been collated on the Department of Administrative Reforms and Public Grievances website.

The grievances of corruption, which are sorted according to ministries, include bribery, embezzlement of funds and harassment by government officials while dealing with Covid-19 cases.

“The issue came up at the November 25 meeting of PRGATI,” an official who did not wish to be named said. PRAGATI (Pro-Active Governance and Timely Implementation) which includes various ministries and is the government’s administrative reform initiative that was launched in 2015.

Officials said that the data asked for by Prime Minister Narendra Modi was being collated and will be presented to him at the follow-up meeting on Monday. “The PM wanted to the nature of complaints regarding the three Ps – persons, process and policy,” the official mentioned above said.

The categories under which the grievances are filed are: Inadequate facilities in hospitals, problem in donating to PMCares fund, essential supplies not being provided, request for rescue from a foreign country, being stuck at some place due to lockdown, harassment, lockdown not adhered to, examination-related, quarantine-related, suggestions and others, HT had reported.

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