Lucknow (Uttar Pradesh): The Uttar Pradesh government has suspended the district probation officer and the officiating superintendent of a shelter home in Kanpur where 57 inmates, including five pregnant girls, had tested positive for COVID-19 last week, a senior official said on Saturday.
District probation officer Ajit Kumar and officiating superintendent Mithlesh Pal have been charged for not following the state government's coronavirus guidelines and failing to take care of the inmates, Director Women Welfare Manoj Kumar Rai said.
Both have been accused of not properly discharging their duties and tarnishing the image of the department, Rai said, adding that they also failed to promptly correct the misleading reports being circulated on TV, print and social media regarding the shelter home.
On June 21, 57 girls of the government shelter home in Swarup Nagar in Kanpur were found COVID-19 positive, following which they were admitted to hospital, while 114 others were shifted elsewhere for quarantine, Rai said.
Authorities had lodged a case against unknown people for misleading public by claiming that two of the infected girls had HIV and hepatitis.
Also read: Bihar shelter home cases: Recommended action against erring govt servants, CBI tells SC
Congress general secretary Priyanka Gandhi Vadra had also attacked the BJP government over the inmates of the shelter home testing positive for the disease.
She had equated the incident with the Muzaffarpur shelter home case in Bihar where cases of alleged sexual abuse were reported.
The Kanpur district administration had clarified that five of the 57 girls who tested positive for coronavirus had come to the shelter home when they were already pregnant.
PTI Report
