Too Close For Comfort Now - Covid Claims 2 Cabinet Ministers in UP

Seventy-three year old former Indian opener Chetan Chauhan and a cabinet minister in the Yogi Adityanath government succumbed to Covid 19 at a private hospital in Gurgaon on Sunday.

Shifted to Gurgaon’s private hospital after his condition deteriorated with renal failure on Saturday, Chauhan died due to multiple organ failure.

He had been admitted to Lucknow’s Sanjay Gandhi Post Graduate Institute (SGPGI) after testing COVID 19 positive on July 12.

He is the second minister in Adityanath’s cabinet to succumb to COVID 19 so far.

Exactly two weeks ago, Uttar Pradesh’s Technical Education Minister 62- year old Kamal Rani Varun died of the disease on August 2.

An MLA from Ghatampur in Kanpur Nagar, she was the only woman in the state cabinet and had been a member of the 11th and 12th Lok Sabha.

Representing Naugawan Sadat assembly constituency in Amroha, Chauhan had played 40 Tests and 7 ODIs from 1969 to 1981. He had also been the Indian cricket team’s manager.

With the death of Chauhan, UP gets the dubious distinction of having lost two cabinet ministers to COVID 19.

Another cabinet minister for Legislature, Justice, Rural Engineering Service, Brajesh Pathak is seriously ill. He was rushed to SGPGI a few days ago after he developed breathing problems after being under treatment at home.

Cabinet Minister Rajendra Pratap Singh alias Moti Singh Minister for Rural Development and Overall village development, has however, recovered from the disease as has former cabinet minister and now BJP state president Swantatra Dev Singh.

During the last 24 hours UP has reported 4454 fresh COVID 19 cases taking the total number of active infected cases in UP to 51537 until Sunday evening.

The total number of deaths so far is 2449 of which 58 died on Sunday alone.

The worst conditions prevails in Lucknow with 814 fresh cases reported on Sunday followed by Kanpur (397), Gorakhpur (385), Varanasi (215), Bareilly (155),Prayagraj (138) and Ghaziabad (121). The other districts have cases in double or single digits.