Gautam Gambhir has sparred with the Delhi government on its handling of the coronavirus crisis.
BJP MP Gautam Gambhir on Friday lashed out at the Aam Aadmi Party government in Delhi over the coronavirus situation in the capital, saying that Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal is more interested in passing the buck than taking steps to arrest the alarming surge in cases.
The cricketer-turned-politician took to Twitter to target Mr Kejriwal after the Supreme Court pulled up the Delhi government over the "horrendous, horrific and pathetic" situation in the national capital and said coronavirus patients are being treated "worse than animals".
Seeking a response from Delhi, Maharashtra, Tamil Nadu and West Bengal, and the central government as it took followed up reports of improper handling of COVID-19 patients and disposal of bodies in the country, the court asked Mr Kejriwal's administration to explain the fall in testing in the city.
Delhi has the third highest number of coronavirus cases in India after Maharashtra and Tamil Nadu. The national capital has logged 34,687 patients so far and 1,085 deaths, according to the Union Health Ministry. Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal has repeatedly said that the city is prepared to tackle the pandemic amid spurt in the number of infections.
However, amid harrowing accounts of people struggling to get a hospital bed in the capital, Deputy Chief Minister Manish Sisodia this week said that Delhi's infections of coronavirus will climb to 5.5 lakh by the end of July and it does not have the hospital capacity to handle such an outbreak.
Despite a strict imposed in March, the disease is spreading in India at one of the world's fastest rates as it re-opens a battered economy. The caseload stood at nearly 3 lakh, the world's fourth largest, and overtook the United Kingdom in on Thursday.
Gautam Gambhir has sparred with the Delhi government on its handling of the coronavirus crisis, praising Lieutenant Governor Anil Baijal for striking down its move to reserve hospital beds for only residents of the city.
"Excellent step by LG to overrule Delhi Govt''s idiotic order of not treating patients from other states! India is ONE and we have to fight this pandemic together! #IndiaFightsCorona," Mr Gambhir had tweeted.