Covid-19 curbs set to ease by levels for Mumbai

From Monday, all shops in the city can open; restaurants can serve customers till 4pm on weekdays; private offices can be reopened with 50% staff, but only till 4pm; and people can go for jogging and to gymnasiums, albeit with certain conditions.

An all-too-familiar limp back to normalcy is on the cards for Mumbai and other cities in the Mumbai Metropolitan (MMR) region.

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From Monday, all shops in the city can open; restaurants can serve customers till 4pm on weekdays; private offices can be reopened with 50% staff, but only till 4pm; and people can go for jogging and to gymnasiums, albeit with certain conditions.

While suburban trains won’t be allowed for the general public, commuters can travel by BEST buses provided there are no standing passengers, a difficult ask during peak hours in Mumbai, Thane and Navi Mumbai. Manufacturing units can function with 50% of the workforce’s capacity and with travel arrangements for the staff. E-commerce firms will function regularly. Wedding ceremonies can be attended by up to 50 people. Although the state has allowed all women commuters to use local trains, the Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC) on Saturday restricted the services to medical staff and a few essential sectors.

Following the devastating second Covid-19 wave that forced a lockdown in Maharashtra from April, the government’s five-level plan to ease curbs, based on weekly positivity rate and occupancy of oxygen beds in districts, comes into effect from Monday. The state has classified 35 districts and 11 municipal corporations with more than 1 million population into five categories – level one to five. The degree of relaxation of restrictions has been decided as per the level of severity of Covid-19 in those districts. Level one has the least restrictions, while level five will have the most. Mumbai comes under level three (see box).

“The order and classification of areas are more pragmatic. This fixes responsibility on local administrations — district collectors or municipal corporations — to reduce the spread of the virus and augment infrastructure,” said a state official on the unlock order, issued late on Friday. The new order was issued by relief and rehabilitation secretary Aseem Kumar Gupta, after the state disaster management authority decided so on Thursday.

Mumbai and most of the MMR cities fall in level three. None of the state’s districts falls in level five. Eleven municipal corporations with more than 1 million population — Mumbai, Pune, Thane, Nashik, Pimpri-Chinchwad, Aurangabad, Vasai-Virar, Navi Mumbai, Nagpur, Solapur and Kalyan-Dombivli — have been treated as separate units. Mumbai, Vasai-Virar, Ulhasnagar, Bhiwandi and Mira-Bhayandar fall under level three, while Navi Mumbai and Kalyan-Dombivli fall under level two. Areas under Panvel Municipal Corporation (PMC) fall under level 4.

“We have made it clear that district and city authorities will the powers to impose stricter curbs if they feel it is necessary. The Mumbai corporation has taken the decision to not allow trains for women as it leads to lot of crowding, affecting the entire MMR. Similar decisions will be taken at the local level,” said an official from the relief and rehabilitation department.

The official said most districts are happy with the exercise. “There was bit of confusion over the opening up of activities, but they have been clarified in a meeting chaired by the CM. We have tried to make it simple to understand at an administrative level and at the same time, the powers and responsibilities have been left to the local level,” he said.

Level-three areas, however, will continue to have a curfew after 5pm every day. Salons, spas and beauty parlours have been allowed to operate at 50% of their capacity. Social, cultural, entertainment events and political/election meetings have been allowed with 50% capacity of the venue in level-three areas. The number of allowed attendees has been increased to 50 for wedding events in these areas, the notification stated. Religious places remain shut.

However, the notification warns of blanket restrictions across the state if the oxygen-bed occupancy goes up. “The state’s daily production of medical oxygen is 1,200 metric tonnes, which can cater to a maximum of 60,000 patients needing O2. If the number of patients ranged between 35,000 and 45,000, no part of the state shall be below level three and no part be below level four, if it’s more than 45,000 patients. Currently, the oxygen bed occupancy is less than 35,000 patients and thus the oxygen trigger mentioned above does not get operated. In such a scenario, local level authorities are empowered to decide the level of restrictions they fall under,” the notification says.

The state government is also considering introducing another parameter linked to the vaccination. “The relaxation will be linked with the vaccination percentage at a later stage, once vaccines are amply available. The district administrations witnessing a drop in positivity rare and oxygen-bed occupancy will have to report the constant drops to claim changing of the unlock gradation. Upscaling to an upper level will be based on the score of two weeks and it needs to show a consistent downwards trend on both parameters. We have no room left for local authorities manipulate data. For the upscaling in levels, they will have to approach the chief secretary, but to impose more curbs of downgrading, they can do it at their level,” another official from Mantralaya said.

Maharashtra has reported fewer than 20,000 daily cases over the past week, after reporting a daily caseload of more than 50,000 cases at the beginning of May. The state had 196,894 active cases, as of Friday evening.

Meanwhile, the Navi Mumbai Municipal Corporation (NMMC) issued an unlock notification based on the level two guidelines of the state. All the shops in Navi Mumbai will be allowed to operate at regular timings, the malls, restaurants, cinema halls will be allowed at 50% capacity, weddings, funerals and social functions will be allowed with 50 guests. All private and government offices have been allowed to be opened with 100% attendance.

Municipal commissioner Abhijit Bangar, said, “Though the positivity rate in Navi Mumbai is down to 2% as required under level 1, the oxygen beds occupancy is over 25% and hence the unlocking has been ordered under level 2. The order will come into effect from 7 am on June 7 and will be in force till 7am on June 14. We will take further action next week based on the review of the situation then.”

He said that while NMMC have allowed relaxations in the city, minimal attendance in closed and public places and minimal group movements will be the guiding principles.

(with inputs from G Mohiuddin Jeddy)

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