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Taking cognizance of the incidents of health officials demanding bribes for issuing Covid negative certificates to employees, the administrative body of Bengaluru city, Bruhat Bengaluru Mahanagara Palike (BBMP) issued a clarification on Tuesday stating that employees who have completed mandatory seven-day home isolation need not bring any covid free declaration while re-joining at work.
As per the report by the Times of India (TOI), the clarification came after a contractual employee at a private firm alleged that she was asked to pay Rupees 250 by a BBMP health centre worker in exchange for issuing a Covid free certificate, which the company had asked for during her re-joining after her seven-day home isolation.
Upon resisting paying the unlawful amount, the woman was made to wait unnecessarily and was schooled by the BBMP officials as well.
Citing the ‘Covid Negative/Free’ certificate which many of the employers have been asking for lately, as redundant BBMP Health Officer Dr AS Balasundar said, “Since symptoms during the third wave have been milder, many people preferred home isolation. It is not about just one person testing positive, the whole family is getting infected. Hence, home isolation is ideal.”
Welcoming the decision by the municipal administration, many office goers said that they did not exhibit any major symptoms except that of a viral cough and cold. They also asserted that even after completing a seven-day period of home isolation, the symptoms may take time to go away, in which case a retest would be rather inconclusive of the actual situation and would only add to their work being affected.
With the resurgence of the number of Covid cases since the last quarter of the previous year, many metro cities like Bengaluru have seen a regular rise in the daily reported cases. As such, many employers have resorted to seeking covid free declarations from their workers to ensure safety on their part. This noble idea, however, has soon turned sour owing to the petty greediness of some.
