NEW DELHI: A plea was filed prior to the Supreme Court looking for stricter punishment to restrain hoarding, profiteering, adulteration and shameful marketing of objects, like medications, health and oxygen tanks throughout the continuing Covid-19 pandemic.
The request, filed by advocate and BJP leader Ashwini Kumar Upadhyay, additionally sought direction to the Centre and claims to encircle the National Security Act against individuals involved in those actions and grab their 100 percent”benami properties and disproportionate assets”.
Many people lost their loved ones because of hoarding of beds, profiteering, adulteration in black and drugs advertising, it alleged.
The prosecution also urged that the apex court to rule that the penalty for offences for hoarding, profiteering, adulteration and shameful advertisements and the sentence will be sequential, not concurrent.
It sought a direction to the Centre to test the International Laws about hoarding, profiteering, adulteration and shameful advertisements and take suitable measures to add a Chapter for all these offences from the Indian Penal Code.
“In choice, steer the Law Commission of India to analyze international laws associated with hoarding, adulteration, profiteering and shameful advertising and organize a report on three weeks,” it recommended that the court.
“Countless EWS and BPL taxpayers expired on roads, in automobiles, in hospitals chemicals as well as their houses because of hoarding of hospital beds, and adulterated Covid medications, black marketing of medical equipment such as air purifier and enormous profiteering in the selling of life saving shots such as Remdesivir, Tocilizumab, etc.
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” the plea mentioned.
The petition included that at Delhi itself, Remdesivir shot was marketed in the rate of Rs 70,000 although its cost will be Rs 899.
“Likewise, high quantity of oxygen concentrators and oxygen tanks have been retrieved from other areas,” it added.
It maintained that because of unsuccessful obsolete vague legislation, the government has completely failed to restrain lots of beds in hospitals, spurious drug creation, profiteering, adulteration and shameful advertisements, as this pandemic has begun.
“The district government has failed to restrain sale and manufacture of imitation sanitisers, hide, thermometer, oximeter, nebuliser, etc.
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“Though approximately 300 FIRs have been lodged from the individual for hoarding, profiteering, adulteration and black-marketing, neither the NSA was invoked nor their assets seized,” it stated.