Don’t step out, celebrate Diwali from homes: Maharashtra CM Uddhav Thackeray

Maharashtra, keeping in line with it declining trend in cases, reported 4,907 new infections and 125 deaths on Wednesday, taking the tally to 1,731,833 and toll to 45,560.

Maharashtra chief minister Uddhav Thackeray on Wednesday once again appealed to citizens to celebrate Diwali in a low-key manner, so as to avoid a potential second wave of Covid-19 infections.

People crowd the Dadar market for Diwali shopping. (AFP)

Maharashtra, keeping in line with it declining trend in cases, reported 4,907 new infections and 125 deaths on Wednesday, taking the tally to 1,731,833 and toll to 45,560. Active cases in the state stand at 88,070.

Reminding citizens about the potential second wave of infections, on the lines of the ones being witnessed in Europe, Thackeray called for citizens to celebrate the festival without venturing out of their homes.

“I am celebrating Diwali sitting at home and exchanging greetings online. It is important to keep ourselves and our families safe until the vaccine is available and reaches us. It is only because of the restraint adopted by the people during the festivals of all religions in the past eight months, we could keep the virus at bay. It is possible even in future if we adopt Covid-19-appropriate behaviour,” he said.

Thackeray said that in European countries where the pandemic was in its second and third wave, authorities were facing a shortage of doctors, medical staff and even equipment.

“If we become complacent, a surge could be witnessed in the state. We are planning to open schools and colleges after Diwali, but to enable it, following the protocol strictly is more important,” he said.

While the state has been recording daily cases at an average of 4,857 in the first 11 days of October, Mumbai’s average number of daily cases remained at 841 this month. Mumbai on Wednesday recorded 1,069 new Covid-19 cases, up from the figures of the past two days — 535 on Tuesday and 599 on Monday.

Mumbai also recorded 22 deaths owing to Covid-19 on Wednesday. The total number of cases in the city has now gone up to 266,748 and the toll has risen to 10,506.

There are 15,825 active cases in Mumbai, with a recovery rate of 90%. The average growth rate of Covid-19 cases is 0.29% with a doubling rate of 243 days. Mumbai has conducted 1,648,347 Covid-19 tests so far.

Following Mumbai, Pune retained its second position in terms of cases and deaths, with 573 new cases (229 in rural parts, 218 in city and 126 in Pimpri-Chichwad) and 16 deaths.

Nashik clocked 441 cases and five deaths, while Nagpur logged 237 cases and seven deaths. Satara reported 201 cases and nine deaths. The state’s case fatality rate (CFR) stands at 2.63%. Mumbai Metropolitan Region (MMR) added 1,832 cases and 41 deaths in the last 24 hours.

Anticipating a second wave, state authorities have been directed to gear up the augmentation of health infrastructure. “Except school-colleges and religious places, there will be no more activities opened up. Though the state government has asked railways to keep their plan ready for operations of local trains for general public, we are not pushing to begin them immediately. We will allow students to travel in trains after Diwali, but the decision to open for all in non-peak hours will depend on cases 10 days after Diwali,” said an official from Mantralaya.

Meanwhile, the state conducted 53,427 tests in 24 hours at a positivity rate of 7.64%. The state’s recovery rate stands at 92.23%, after 9,164 more patients recovered on Wednesday, taking the tally of recovered patients to 1,597,255. State has 941,118 patients under home quarantine and 6,551 people institutionally quarantined.