New Delhi: The Congress has described the deaths of 49 infants in the Farrukhabad district hospital as a "massacre" and asserted the Yogi Adityanath government was determined to make the entire state "sick".

A Congress delegation led by state unit chief Raj Babbar visited the district hospital, where 49 infants died in a month, most of them from "perinatal asphyxia", a condition in which a newborn has trouble breathing.

Babbar alleged there was a shortage of doctors in the hospital. "Against the required strength of 35, there are only 11 doctors in the hospital. How can proper medical care be expected in such a situation," he said in Farrukhabad.

The UPCC president said the Congress would fight to ensure justice to all those who had lost their children. He said the BJP government had "decided to make the entire state sick". "The chief minister is not sensitive. The BJP should bring another face in place of him," he said. The district hospital recorded 49 deaths -- 30 in neo- natal ICU and 19 during delivery -- between July 20 and August 21.