Made-in-India ventilators: Export banned in March but lifted in July

On March 24, 2020, the Union government banned the export of all types of ventilators owing to a massive shortage in India. A week later on March 31, the Government of India placed an order for 40,000 ventilators from BEL-Skanray (30,000) & AgVa (10,000).

Three months later on June 23 the PMO issued a press note stating that a) Rs 2000 crore had been paid by PM CARES for 50,000 ventilators; and b) suppliers were BEL-Skanray (30,000) & AgVa (10,000).

With the suppliers and the number of ventilators matching the order placed in March, the question was whether it was the same order and if the PM CARES order was the ‘same’ as that of the GOI earlier?

One assumes that out of the 50,000 PM CARES ventilators, 40,000 had already been ordered in March by the Govt. of India, to be paid from the public exchequer and not from donations received later by the ‘private’ PM CARES Fund. Did PM CARES allot Rs 2000 crore for just the remaining 10,000 ventilators? Or did PM CARES reimburse the Govt of India for 40,000 ventilators?

It is far from clear and nobody knows. Remember, PM CARES has been ruled to be out of the ambit of the Right to Information Act? Although the Fund is managed by IAS officers at the PMO, the Government treats this as a ‘private’ fund so that it is audited by a Chartered Accountant (presumably known to Piyush Goyal, a former BJP treasurer) and not the Comptroller & Auditor General of India (CAG). (3/13)

The ventilators ordered by Govt of India/PM CARES cost approximately Rs 1.5-2 lakh each in the market. We don’t know how much Govt. of India paid for 40,000 ventilators in March. But in June, PM CARES claims to have paid Rs 4 lakh/ventilator (twice the market price).

PM CARES also claimed on 23rd June that 2,923 ventilators had been manufactured & ONLY 1,340 had been delivered. But a week earlier, BEL-Skanray informed me in response to an RTI application that they had manufactured 4000 PM CARES ventilators as of June 15. So, from where did PM CARES get the figure of 2,923?

What is clear in any case is that by the end of June, 50,000 ventilators had not been delivered. Nor had the 40,000 GOI ordered ventilators been delivered.

Actually, only 6% of these ventilators had been manufactured between March and June. Yet, something very strange happened last week when the Government abruptly lifted the export ban on ‘Made-in-India’ ventilators although suppliers are a long way from fulfilling the commitment made to the Government and PM CARES.

Significantly, all ventilators ordered by Govt/PM CARES are non-BiPAP. In layman’s terms, it means that they cannot supply oxygen without the risky and invasive process of tubing. Doctors in India treating Covid-19 prefer non-invasive BiPAP ventilators.

But without consulting doctors or experts, PM CARES appears to have paid twice the market price for 50,000 nonBiPAP invasive ventilators which are, if doctors are to be believed, practically useless. Some of these have already been flagged as sub-standard.

PM CARES therefore appears to have spent Rs 2000 crore on 50,000 useless invasive ventilators that Indian hospitals don’t want. With the lifting of the export ban, these same ventilators, one presumes, will be exported at market price (Rs 2 lakh/ventilator).

Why has the export ban been lifted, if domestic demand has not yet been met?