Ruling party legislators allege bed blocking scam in Bengaluru

Police conduct sting operation, arrest two suspected to have contacts in BBMP war room

In an embarrassing turn of events for the government, a group of ruling party legislators led by Bengaluru South MP Tejasvi Surya, accompanied by three MLAs from the South Zone, live streamed an exposé of alleged corruption in bed allocation for COVID-19 patients by the city’s civic body. The alleged scam in the South Zone war room has raised questions on the integrity of the bed allocation system across the city. Mr. Surya and the legislators - Ravi Subramanya, Uday Garudachar and Satish Reddy - held a press conference and alleged that beds were being blocked in the name of asymptomatic patients in home isolation, only to be sold to others hours later by staff in South Zone war room. In a dramatic turn of events, Mr. Surya and the three MLAs visited the war room in Jayanagar armed with bed allocation details and confronted officers. “There has been no transparency in bed allocation. I had to threaten a senior officer in the wee hours of Tuesday that unless we were provided with the raw data of bed allocation, I would stage a protest in front of the war room. A prima facie analysis of the data revealed the scam,” he said.