A parliamentary panel has called principal scientific advisor to the government K Vijay Raghavan and some other top officials to brief it on the response to the COVID-19 outbreak and the country's preparedness to deal with a future pandemic.
Raghavan is also co-chair of the Empowered Committee for COVID-19 Response, along with NITI Aayog member Vinod Paul.
The meeting of the Parliamentary Standing Committee on Science and Technology, Environment, Forests and Climate Change, headed by senior Congress leader Jairam Ramesh, is scheduled for July 10.
This will be the first meeting of any parliamentary panel on the COVID-19 outbreak.
This will also be the first meeting of the Rajya Sabha's standing committee since the COVID-19 pandemic forced closure of Parliament in late March.
According to a notice issued by the Rajya Sabha Secretariat, the agenda of the meeting is preparedness to deal with COVID-19 and other pandemic in future.
When contacted, Ramesh told PTI that officials of the Department of Biotechnology, Department of Scientific and Industrial Research, Council of Scientific and Industrial Research (CSIR) and the Principal Scientific Advisor to the government have been called to brief the standing committee.
India's COVID-19 cases soared by over 20,000 in a day for the first time taking the country's infection tally to 6,25,544 on Friday, while the death toll climbed to 18,213 with 379 new fatalities, according to the Union Health Ministry.
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