The Centre has told the Supreme Court that Rs 4 lakh compensation cannot be paid to all those who died due to Covid-19 as it would exhaust the disaster relief funds.

The Centre’s affidavit came in response to a PIL seeking “minimum standards of relief” and ex-gratia payment to Covid-19 deceased.

The Centre has said that compensation of Rs 4 lakh cannot be paid to victims of Covid-19 as the disaster management law mandating compensation applies only to natural disasters like earthquake, floods etc.

Nearly 4 lakh people have died in India since the beginning of the pandemic, according to the official Covid-19 figures released by the health ministry.

“If ex-gratia of Rs 4 lakh is given for every person who loses life due to Covid-19, the entire amount of SDRF may possibly be spent on this item alone, and indeed the total expenditure may go up further,” said the Centre.

“If the entire SDRF funds get consumed on ex-gratia for Covid-19 victims, the States may not have sufficient funds for organizing Covid-19 response, for provision of various essential medical and other supplies, or to take care of other disasters like cyclones, floods, etc. Hence, the prayer of the petitioner for payment of ex-gratia to all deceased persons due to Covid-19, is beyond the fiscal affordability of the State governments,” said the Centre.

The government has further said that Covid is an ongoing scenario and minimum standards of relief and compensation differ in this case from other types of disasters.

Insurance claims are being processed by the District Collectors and forwarded to the insurance company for release of funds to the claimants, said the government. It added that Rs 442.4 crore has been released to the insurance companies.

The government further informed the Supreme Court that in 2019-20, additional funds Rs 1,113.21 crore were released to the States/UTs towards management and containment of Covid-19 over under the National Health Mission.

“Rs 8,257.89 crore have been released to the States/UTs under the India Covid-19 Emergency Response and Health Systems Preparedness Package through NHM,” said the government.