New Delhi: The dreaded COVID-19 is taking a heavy toll on human life and is sparing none. Not even the VVIPs.
Six sitting MLAs and three sitting MPs have succumbed to the virus till date. Among the MLAs were state ministers as well. More than 85,000 people in India have died of COVID-19, so far.
The biggest name in COVID casualty in India has been former President Pranab Mukherjee. He underwent a brain surgery at Army’s R&R Hospital here, but it was the killer virus that caused a deterioration in his condition, and finally demise.
Among the sitting MPs who died due to the virus was newly-elected Rajya Sabha member of BJP, Ashok Gasti. The 55-year-old was diagnosed with severe COVID-19 pneumonia and admitted to Manipal Hospital on the Old Airport Road on September 2. What made his condition worse was multi-organ failure. Gasti was on life support when he passed away.
Earlier, Tirupati MP Balli Durga Prasad Rao died in a Chennai hospital. The 64-year-old Lok Sabha MP had comorbidities when he tested positive for Covid-19. The YSRCP leader was also a four-time MLA from Gudur in Nellore. He first won the Assembly poll when he was just 28.
Rao was the second sitting MP to have succumbed to the virus. The Congress MP from Kanyakumari in Tamil Nadu, H Vasanthakumar, was the first Covid-19 casualty among sitting MPs. A shocked Prime Minister tweeted his picture with the MP to condole his death.
The 70-year-old too breathed his last in Chennai, at the Apollo Hospital.
It is just September and the pandemic far from being over, in the words of the WHO itself, India has already seen at least six MLAs lose the battle of life against the virus. From the Hindi heartland of Uttar Pradesh to the Gangetic Bengal, the loss has been sudden and painful for their respective political parties and constituents.
In Uttar Pradesh, two ministers lost their lives in a span of one month due to the virus. First, it was the only woman Minister in the Yogi Adityanath’s Cabinet — Uttar Pradesh’s Technical Education Minister Kamal Rani Varun — followed by cricketer turned Sainik Welfare and Civil Security Minister Chetan Chauhan.
Meanwhile, in Madhya Pradesh, at least one MLA has lost the battle against COVID-19. Congress MLA from Biaora in Rajgarh, Govardhan Dangi, died due to COVID-19 on September 15 in Gurugram’s Medanta Hospital at the age of 54.
In West Bengal, the situation is equally grim. Bengal lost two MLAs to COVID-19 — Samaresh Das, the Trinamool MLA from Egra in East Midnapore, and his party colleague Tamonash Ghosh from Falta constituency in South 24 Parganas district. While 76-year-old Das developed kidney complications, 60-year-old Ghosh’s death shocked many in the party.
Down south, Tamil Nadu saw one of the first COVID-related deaths of any lawmaker in the country. DMK MLA J Anbazhagan from Chepauk-Thiruvallikeni constituency died in June. He was 61. He was put on ventilator support on June 3 when his breathing problem worsened. His cardiac and chronic kidney diseases only contributed to his critical condition, resulting in his death. (IANS)
