Due to second wave of the COVID-19 pandemic, the need of oxygen has increased multifold. In a recent interview, oxygen provider Inox Air Products CEO took a jab at Delhi and said that, “Delhi govt was just complaining”. The remark comes after Delhi’s CM Kejriwal had consistently asked the Centre to provide the state with more oxygen.

In the past couple of months, the healthcare crisis turned into a political fiasco of blame game with national capital Delhi alleging that they were not provided Oxygen to save lives, while Centre alleged that it is state’s responsibility to procure the oxygen. The tug of war between the Centre reached a point where the Supreme Court had to step in and take matters into its own hand.

Enough oxygen to maintain the situation

In an interview to Quartz, Siddharth Jain, CEO of Inox Air Products said how oxygen consumption of a nation is directly proportional to the increase in cases. India’s requirement before the pandemic struck was 700 MT of oxygen a day. After the onset of the first wave, the demand reached to 3,000 MT a day and currently it’s about 8,000 MT.

Jain said that currently Inox is producing enough oxygen to maintain the situation with the current number of cases. However, he also added that more states would need to announce lockdowns so that the caseload decreases.

“No country would have been prepared for this”: Inox CEO Siddharth Jain

The oxygen making company’s CEO also agreed to the fact that no amount of preparations would have been enough even if India had prepared for the second wave of the pandemic. “I don’t think any country would have been prepared for this kind of acceleration”, Jain said.

On the logistical challenges faced by the company

Jain was also inquired about the logistical challenges his company was facing. To this he said that when medical oxygen is produced in a liquid form it’s at 183 degrees centigrade and thus stored in special containers. In India there are only 1,170 cryogenic tankers available for transport out of which Inox has only 320.

Before the pandemic, out of 100 tankers, Inox would manufacture medical oxygen only for 15 such tankers which went to medical space and 85 would go to industrial space. And thus, the company’s plants are located in areas that are closer to industry and not around hospitals which are situated between densely populated areas.

Since there is requirement for oxygen at these hospitals, the company is facing a lot of logistical issues to transport the tankers.

Maharashtra, Gujarat and UP among the biggest oxygen consumers

Jain was also asked about which all states his company is supplying oxygen to. To this he claimed that the largest oxygen consumer states are Maharashtra, Gujarat and Uttar Pradesh. Jain said that his company is facing the greatest number of challenges in Uttar Pradesh, Delhi and other northern states. He said that as there’s not much industrial activity in the north India, that particular region only manufactures 10% of the required oxygen. The demand and supply ratio is skewed because of that.

“Is it not Delhi’s job to pick up the oxygen?”

Perhaps the most interesting insight came when Jain shared about the Delhi oxygen supply issue. He said that currently only 70 plants manufacture oxygen in the country and the union govt’s job is to tell manufacturers to produce a certain amount of oxygen based on the demand by the states. He further said that it is not the Union govt’s job to pick that oxygen and deliver it to the end locations.

“It is not their job to go to Odisha, pick up the oxygen and come to Mumbai and pour it in a tank. What do the states exist for? What is their job? It is the job of the state to go and organise the logistics and go and get the allocated product,”

-Siddharth Jain said.

Delhi complained about the situation instead of working on logistics

When asked whether Delhi was only complaining about the situation instead of organizing the logistics, Jain agreed whole-heartedly and said, “Yes, absolutely. It was only later, after a lot of pressure was put on them, they started moving it.”

“Why are Delhi hospitals not taking patients?”

Jain made another dig on the Delhi govt and said-

“Are you aware in Delhi, they’re refusing patients into hospitals? Why are hospitals not taking patients? Does the hospital have no duty to organise the oxygen themselves? Are they allowed to shut gates for their patients?”

“Nobody is understanding the logistical challenges”

The Inox CEO also claimed that the logistical challenges are immense and his company is trying hard to work on them.

“We are trying, nobody is understanding the logistical challenges in supplying oxygen to a nation that is at war simultaneously in 30 states (India has 28 states and eight union territories). It’s a herculean task,”

-he said.

Jain also said that oxygen manufacturers will benefit from a nation-wide lockdown.

“I certainly think it will help…I think most states are already under lockdown… At this point what we really need is to break the transmission chain. Come what may,”

-Jain said.