Farmers Movement Archive

Farmers’ body opens free-of-cost 30-bed Covid facility in Bazpur

Rudrapur: From businessmen to NGOs, from housewives to youths, almost every section of the society is coming forward to help others in need during the second and more deadly wave of the Covid-19 pandemic in Uttarakhand. This time, farmers of the Terai region have pooled their resources to help the Covid-infected. The Samyukta Kisan Morcha (SKM), a farmers’ association, has opened a 30-bed facility for Covid-19 patients in Bazpur town of Udham Singh Nagar district. The facility — set up in the langar (community kitchen) hall of Gurdwara Shri Guru Singh Sabha — will provide free-of-cost treatment to those in need. Jagtar Singh Bajwa, the spokesperson of SKM, told TOI, “We have been protesting at the Ghazipur border (near Delhi) against the three agri-reform laws notified last year but we always kept a tab on the prevailing Covid-19 situation back home in Uttarakhand. In such testing times, we wanted to help out people in need and thus, came up with the idea of opening a free facility for Covid-19 patients.” In a similar vein, Gurpreet Singh Rummy, president of the Indirapuram Gurdwara management committee, said, “We are planning to start such centres in Kashipur and Rudrapur towns as well. Besides, we are contacting the Gurdwara management committees in hilly areas to arrange more such facilities where people from remote areas can be administered free-of-cost treatment.” Notably, Rummy has been running drives to provide medical oxygen for free to the people in need in Delhi. Bajwa added that doctors associated with Khalsa Help International, a social organisation founded by Rummy, will look after the patients in the new Bazpur facility. “We were supported by the officials of the Gurdwara management committee who let us have the ground floor of the religious place. Subsequently, we converted the space into a Covid-19 care facility in just two days.” Elaborating on the facilities in the free-of-cost Covid-19 care centre in Bazpur, Karm Singh Padda, state president of the Bharatiya Kisan Union (BKU), said, “Oxygen concentrators, cylinders, beds, emergency medical equipment and a medicine counter have been installed at the centre. We will soon be installing ventilators as well. The patients will be administered free-of-cost treatment here. We will also serve free meals to the patients and their attendants.”

The Times of India

2021-05-23

Dehradun