There's no community spread and fatalities mismatch: claims K Palaniswami

Tamil Nadu is the second worst affected state in India, with more than 37,000 infections and 326 fatalities.

While the daily number of infections is on a constant rise, Chief Minister K Palaniswami has been alleged of hiding the coronavirus figures, especially death rate.

Also read: With record 1927 fresh Covid-19 cases, Tamil Nadu's case count crosses 36,000

However, Palaniswami has rejected all allegations of under-reporting of fatalities.

"Where is the difference in deaths ? ... There is no ground to conceal deaths and nobody can hide deaths," Palaniswami slammed the local reporters who asked him about the allegation.

The Chief Minister also claimed that there is no community transmission of coronavirus in the state.

After the allegation, the government set up a reconciliation committee to look into alleged mismatch of coronavirus deaths. However, the Chief Minister, a day later, jumped in defense of his administration claiming manipullting of figures is impossible when a daily bulletin is being issued on the basis of daily testing, recoveries, infections, deaths and active cases.

"How it (deaths) could be shown less ? if somebody dies of COVID-19, the media shows (visuals) and people come to know. This cannot be hidden. For the government, it serves no good (purpose) by hiding deaths," he said.

The reconciliation committee, comprises doctors from the Directorate of Medical and Rural Health Services and Directorate of Medical Education and the city corporation; the panel will look into the question of alleged discrepancies in deaths.

The reconciliation initiative was taken up by the government also in the wake of a complaint by an NGO to authorities claiming that three COVID-19 deaths were not recorded.

(With inputs from PTI)