Maha defers decision on restart of schools; city sees a dip in cases

MUMBAI: The state government on Monday deferred its decision on reopening schools. After earlier announcing that schools will restart from today, the government had a rethink on whether to resume physical classes for students between classes five and eight in rural areas and for classes eight to 12 in urban areas, owing to opposition from the Covid-19 task forces. Officials are not in favour of a restart as the under-18 population is not yet vaccinated.

State chief secretary Sitaram Kunte said, “The decision [on the reopening of schools] has been deferred. We will review the situation in the coming days and decide on it.” Education minister Varsha Gaikwad had earlier announced that schools will reopen from August 17. Later, a detailed SOP was issued. However, in view of opposition from a few cabinet ministers and the task forces, chief minister Uddhav Thackeray convened a meeting of education and health department officials on August 11 to discuss the opening of schools and junior colleges. Meanwhile, Mumbai on Monday recorded a significant decrease in the number of new Covid-19 cases after it dropped to less than 200 (195 fresh infections). Also, the state insisted that employees as well as visitors to malls need to be fully vaccinated, barring those below 18 years of age as they are not vaccinated yet.

The state has issued a circular that both mall customers as well as staff must be fully vaccinated. However, there was no such order for restaurants and shopkeepers, who have been protesting against the compulsory twodoses requirement, saying that they will not be able to function. The Monday circular on malls, however, clarified that those citizens below 18 years would be allowed in malls upon showing proof of their age.

“I will not be able to operate any outlet in the malls as most employees are not yet fully vaccinated. Most of my staff have just taken a single dose and very few have both the doses,” rued Aji Nair, COO – food and beverages division, Mirah Hospitality, which runs 10 hotels in Mumbai and has five outlets in malls. “Apart from the staff, even the mandate for two doses for customers will hurt business,” he added.

Maharashtra on Monday recorded 4,145 new cases and 100 deaths. There were 152,165 tests done on Monday, while the number of recoveries clocked 5,811. There are currently 62,452 active patients across the state, of which Pune tops with 14,610 patients, followed by Thane with 6,938 and Satara with 6,909.

There were 625,414 vaccine doses administered on Monday.