A young child with his pet and belongings near the New Delhi Railway station. (Express Photo by Tashi Tobgyal)
Coronavirus India News Live Updates: With over 1.90 lakh cases, India climbed to the 7th spot from the 9th on 10 countries worst-hit by Covid-19. The death toll stands at 5394. Curbs will be relaxed in states today as Centre’s ‘Unlockdown’ strategy goes into effect from today. The lockdown is now limited only to containment zones for a month till June 30 and states are free to resume normal life outside containment zones.
Even as the Ministry of Home Affairs introduced a number of relaxations in Lockdown 5.0 opening up places of worship, hotels, restaurants and malls from Monday, it has been decided that the Noida-Delhi border would remain closed. The decision was taken on Sunday in consultaion with health and police authorities. The Railways said it would begin operations of 200 special trains from Monday and over 1.45 lakh passengers would travel on the first day.
Addressing the nation during his monthly radio programme ‘Mann ki Baat’, Prime Minister Narendra Modi had cautioned people against showing any laxity in the fight against coronavirus and asked them to be “extra alert and careful”, while acknowledging that the poor and labourers have been hit the hardest by the crisis. “Becoming careless cannot be an option,” he had said.
Private doctor's clinic in Dharavi, which is one of the hotspots of the COVID-19 pandemic in Mumbai (Express photo by Prashant Nadkar)
Delhi is not the only state which has been less than transparent in reporting COVID-19 numbers.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi inaugurated the Silver Jubilee celebrations of Rajiv Gandhi University of Health Sciences, in Karnataka via video conferencing. "25 years mean Rajiv Gandhi University of Health Sciences is in the prime of its youth. This is the age to think even bigger and do even better. I am confident that the University will continue to scale new heights of excellence in the times to come. I would have loved to interact woth you personally had these times not been there. The world is looking at you with gratitude and hope. The world seeks both ‘care’ and ‘cure’ from you. The virus is invisible, but our medical workers are invincible. And in this fight between invisible and invincible, our doctors will win.
The Railways will continue to provide states “as many (trains) as they want,” to transport passengers returning home amid the lockdown but over 250 trains have been “wasted” because states that requested for them could not bring in passengers, Union Railway Minister Piyush Goyal told The Indian Express.
“Sad part is after notifying trains, more than 250 trains they could not use… Maharashtra…it alone could not use more than100 trains as they could not bring passengers. Still, we never complained,” Goyal said in an interview Sunday (Full interview to be published tomorrow). “We have never refused a single train to any state. And as many as they want, we will continue to provide them (trains),” he said.
Bengaluru city police registered an FIR against Padarayanapura ward corporator Imran Pasha for violating social distancing norms while he was being shifted to a designated hospital on Saturday after testing positive for Covid-19.
A video of Pasha waving and greeting his followers while being moved into an ambulance has gone viral on social media attracting criticism. “Despite knowing that he has been infected with Covid-19, the corporator had behaved irresponsibly and had moved around in public, which is very dangerous to others. We will take action against him after he is discharged from the hospital,” a police officer from Jagajeevanram Nagar police station said.
As more and more firms start their activities, it will be for individuals to be conscious of the risks associated with the gathering of people, and to adhere to new behavioural norms not only to protect themselves but also their friends and colleagues. You can expect the full potential of relaxations to be utilised only by the end of the week, as the announcements came over the weekend, and firms and individuals will look for state-specific tweaks to finalise their work/activity plans. Read this week's ExplainSpeaking column by Ravish Tiwari
A fresh picture of Pakistan’s ‘ailing’ former prime minister Nawaz Sharif taking tea at a London café along with some members of his family went viral on social media, sparking a debate on his health with the ruling Pakistan Tehreek-i-Insaf members demanding his return to face corruption cases.
In the picture, the 70-year-old three-time premier is seen sitting at a roadside café with his granddaughters. He sported a blue shalwar kameez and a cap and apparently looked in better health. Some ministers got skeptical about the serious nature of his health, saying Sharif is roaming on London streets and he even did not bother to wear mask in this COVID-19 testing time.
Hong Kong has confirmed its first locally transmitted coronavirus cases in more than two weeks, fuelling concerns over its spread as restrictions on movement are relaxed. The Centre for Health Protection (CHP) said on Sunday it was investigating two confirmed cases of coronavirus, taking the number of cases so far to 1,085. Four people have died of the disease in Hong Kong. The global financial hub last reported a locally transmitted case on May 14, when a 62-year-old man with no travel history was confirmed with coronavirus. The two new cases involved a 34-year-old woman and a 56-year-old man. Neither had a travel history during the incubation or infectious period, CHP said. Contact tracing was under way, it added.
The nationwide tally of coronavirus cases has crossed 1.9 lakh after 8,392 people tested positive in the last 24 hours. The total cases in the country stood at 1,90,535 including 5,394 deaths. India has climbed to seventh from the ninth spot in the list of top 10 nations worst-hit by COVID, with more cases than that of France.
A teashop worker, stranded in a village near Coimbatore during the lockdown, stole a motorbike to take his family home. About two weeks later, on May 29, he had the motorbike delivered back to the owner named Kumar, said police officers. the bike parcelled to the address given in his vehicle Registration Certificate (RC). However, Kumar had to pay Rs 1,400 as luggage and packaging charges before he received the bike.
Under the 'Mission Begin Again', the Maharashtra government has allowed individual outdoor physical exercise like walking, running and jogging, but strictly in the neighbourhood. The guidelines emphasise cycling as a preferred exercise, as it ensures the practice of social distancing. Moreover, government and private offices are to function with 15 per cent and 10 per cent of their existing staff strength, respectively. Home delivery of newspaper has been allowed to resume from June 7. Film shootings are also set to resume. For all three phases, night curfew remains in place from 9 pm to 5 am. Containment zones – there are 3,169 such zones in Maharashtra, including 684 in Mumbai, 177 in Thane and 65 in Pune – are not included in this planned graded opening. The relaxations apply to every area outside these containment zones in the 19 red zones of the state, which essentially include the Mumbai Metropolitan Region and municipal corporation areas of Pune, Solapur, Aurangabad, Malegaon, Nasik, Dhule, Jalgaon, Akola, Amaravati and Nagpur.
Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro joined supporters protesting against Congress and the Supreme Court in Brasilia on Sunday, stoking concerns of an institutional crisis in the nation that now has the world’s second-highest number of coronavirus cases after the US
In a live broadcast on social media, Bolsonaro greeted fans from a helicopter flying over the area where the demonstration was held. He then landed and joined the protest wearing no mask, despite a local government decree mandating them as a way to prevent Covid-19 spread. Bolsonaro, a former army captain, also mounted a federal police horse in front of the protesters, who were carrying banners attacking the Supreme Court and even calling for military action against it and the Congress.
The Noida-Delhi border will remain sealed for movement of people to and from the national capital, the Gautam Buddh Nagar administration said in its latest guidelines for the COVID-19 lockdown issued on Sunday. The decision has been taken as the source of infection in 42 per cent of coronavirus cases detected in the district in the last 20 days has been tracked to Delhi, the guidelines said. The inter-state travel ban exempts ambulances, doctors, goods carriers, media, those directly involved in COVID-19 services and those with passes issued by the administration.
An Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR) scientist who arrived from Mumbai to Delhi roughly two weeks ago has tested positive for Covid-19, and the New Delhi ICMR building will be sanitised and fumigated for two days, it is learnt.
Only essential staff, involved with Covid-19-related work, will be going into the building on Monday. Sources said the scientist who tested positive had last week attended a meeting, which had in attendance NITI Aayog member Dr Vinod Paul, ICMR Director General Dr Balram Bhargava, and Dr R R Gangakhedkar, ICMR’s head of the division of epidemiology.
Amreli district recorded its first Covid-19 death, even as Gujarat reported 438 new cases on Sunday taking the state tally to 16,820. As many as 31 Covid-19 patients succumbed to the infection which include 20 from Ahmedabad, three from Panchmahal, two each from Porbandar and Surat and one each from Amreli, Aravalli, Jamnagar and Rajkot. The total deaths in the state reached 1,041. Read more here
A controversy has erupted after Kanpur Medical College principal Aarti Lalchandani, in a viral video, was purportedly heard referring to Tablighi Jamaat members who tested positive for Covid-19, saying the government should not waste its resources on them.
An event of the Islamic missionary movement in Delhi in late March had emerged as a Covid-19 cluster. Read more here
The coronavirus cases in Uttar Pradesh surged to 8,075 on Sunday in a sharpest spike witnessed so far with the state reporting 378 new cases in the last 24 hours. Four more Covid-19 patients died -- one each in Agra, Meerut, Deoria and Gorakhpur – taking the total death count to 217.
The latest surge rang the alarm bells in Gautam Buddh Nagar (Noida) and Ghaziabad districts which recorded 49 and 33 cases, respectively. Read more here
The death of a 46-year-old clerk working with Panchmahals forest department, who tesed positive for Covid-19 after his cremation, has authorities on their toes after his body was sent with his relatives who held his last rites, reportedly in the presence of a huge gathering.
Over 200 people who are suspected to have come in contact with the patient have been traced from two districts. Contact tracing is also under way at GMERS where the patient was brought in from Godhra Civil Hospital with myocardial infarction (heart attack) on Friday before he died. Read more here
Two districts bordering Delhi, Gurgaon and Faridabad, continued to push the Covid-19 case count in Haryana reporting 97 and 28 cases, respectively in the last 24 hours. The state reported 168 new cases, pushing the sate overall tally to 2,091.
Due to the continuous spike in cases, Haryana’s case-doubling count came down to nine days, Saturday evening. The recovery rate of patients also reduced to 50.12 per cent. Read more here
The Punjab government Sunday issued fresh guidelines for the next phase of lockdown, starting June 1 and allowed the opening of places of worship besides shopping malls, hotels and restaurants from June 8.
The government also allowed the movement of persons till 9 pm. The night curfew will continue for eight hours till 5 am, as per the guidelines issued by the Punjab Home Affairs and Justice Department. Read more here
Maharashtra on Sunday reported 2,487 fresh cases and 89 deaths, taking its overall count of the infected to 67,655 and toll to 2,286.
Until a fortnight ago, Maharashtra was contributing to 33.5 per cent of India’s Covid-19 burden. On Sunday, the share rose to 35.7 per cent, data from state revealed. The overall toll has also more than doubled in the last 15 days. Read more here