Inter-district bus services of the Maharashtra State Road Transport Corporation (MSRTC) resumed on Thursday morning after a gap of almost five months, officials said. The Maharashtra government on Wednesday permitted the state-owned undertaking to re-start inter-district bus operations, which were stopped in March after the enforcement of lockdown to contain the spread of COVID-19.

On Thursday, the first bus from Mumbai Central depot, where the MSRTC headquarters is located, left around 8.30 am for Chiplun in Ratnagiri district with six passengers boarding at the starting point, a transport corporation official said. More passengers were expected at Dadar and other stops, he said. (PTI)

Maharashtra reported its highest single-day spike of 14,492 coronavirus cases on Thursday, which pushed its overall count to 6,43,289, the state health department said. The death of 326 patients increased the toll to 21,359, it said. A total of 12,243 patients were discharged on Thursday following their recovery, the department said in a statement. With this, 4,59,124 COVID-19 patients have been discharged so far, it added. There are 1,62,491 active cases in the state.

The Navi Mumbai police have arrested a man for allegedly cleaning and selling used medical gloves collected from hospitals amid the COVID-19 pandemic, PTI reported.

Acting on a tip-off, the police on Monday evening conducted a raid in Pawne MIDC, where they found that used gloves collected from hospitals were being washed, dried and packaged to be sold in the market, an official said.

Liquid soaps and washing machines were used to clean used gloves, he said, adding that 4 lakh pairs of such disposable gloves worth Rs 6.10 lakh were seized from the premises.

The Maharashtra government has issued a circular saying Muharram should be observed in a simple manner and that processions will not be allowed in the wake of the Covid-19 crisis, news agency PTI reported. In the circular issued on Wednesday, the state government said that the mourning processions will not be allowed this year, in line with the ban imposed on social and religious programmes by the Centre and the state government to combat Covid-19. People living in one society also should not congregate to mourn together, and the Majlis (social, cultural or religious gathering) programme should be organised online adhering to norms, the government said.

A 35-year-old sub-inspector of Mumbai Police died of coronavirus on Thursday, an official said. With this, the Covid death toll in the Mumbai Police force has gone up to 60, he said. The sub-inspector was posted at Deonar police station. He tested positive on August 9 and was undergoing treatment at D Y Patil Hospital in Navi Mumbai. He succumbed to the disease on Thursday, the official said. Another constable who had also tested positive for the disease along with him was later discharged after treatment, the official added.

With the shadow of the Covid-19 pandemic looming large over the upcoming Ganesh festival, the Pimpri-Chinchwad Municipal Corporation (PCMC) on Wednesday prohibited Ganesh installation and immersion processions and urged local residents to instal idols at their home. “Coronavirus cases are rising rapidly… if we don’t want the virus to spread, we should avoid celebrations. There should be no installation or immersion processions in the city,” said Municipal Commissioner Shravan Hardikar. Urging people to celebrate Ganesh festival at home, the PCMC chief said, “People should install Ganesh idols at their home, do the pooja and make arrangements for immersion inside their home… the PCMC will not make any arrangements in the river ghat area for the immersion”.

A new modelling study has predicted that with the current level of relaxation, the peak load on critical healthcare (people requiring oxygen support, ICU, ventilators etc) will be sustained until October-end in Pune.

Till Wednesday morning, there were 1.29 lakh cases of Covid-19 and 3,200 deaths in Pune. Of this, a total of 77,368 Covid-19 cases and 1,849 deaths have been reported from Pune Municipal Corporation (PMC) areas. As the city enters a crucial stage of the pandemic, additional preparation will be needed as the critical case load coming in from outside PMC areas rises during these months. Tata Consultancy Services Research (TRDCC), Pune, in collaboration with Prayas (health group), has developed a fine grained model and their analysis indicates that a significant number of people from Pune are still susceptible to the infection.

After the recent sero-survey in Pune revealed that nearly 50 per cent of samples of local residents from five high-incidence areas had antibodies for coronavirus infection, the Indian Institutes of Science Education and Research (IISER)-led survey has now begun a study to detect ‘neutralising antibodies’ in an effort to understand the human body’s response to the virus. This will possibly be the first of its kind survey in the country. “The sero-survey has been completed in the five highly-affected areas. It was found that 51.5 percent of the 1,664 residents from whom samples were collected had developed antibodies against SARS-CoV-2 infections, ie coronavirus, but it does not indicate immunity through it. So, this is a further study to detect ‘neutralising antibodies’ that protect from the viral infection,” said Professor L S Sashidhara of IISER.

Inter-district bus services of the Maharashtra State Road Transport Corporation (MSRTC) resumed on Thursday morning after a gap of almost five months, officials said. The Maharashtra government on Wednesday permitted the state-owned undertaking to re-start inter-district bus operations, which were stopped in March after the enforcement of lockdown to contain the spread of COVID-19. On Thursday, the first bus from Mumbai Central depot, where the MSRTC headquarters is located, left around 8.30 am for Chiplun in Ratnagiri district with six passengers boarding at the starting point, a transport corporation official said. More passengers were expected at Dadar and other stops, he said.

NCP MP Supriya Sule on Wednesday said that gyms in Maharashtra should be reopened. "Gyms in the state were closed in view of the COVID-19 outbreak. But gyms need to be reopened as the process of unlocking is on now," she tweeted. "@CMOMaharashtra lot many gym operators have made a big investment in this," the Baramati MP added. She also shared on Twitter a letter written by one Ramdas Ingale about the need to reopen gyms.

Maharashtra's Nagpur district on Wednesday reported 1,096 new coronavirus cases, its highest single-day count, taking the tally to 16,733, the local administration said. The district had reported the last highest one-day spike of 1,036 coronavirus patients on August 14. The district registered 30 more coronavirus deaths, taking the fatalities to 579, a District Information Office release said. The number of recovered cases rose to 7,429 after 233 patients were discharged, the release said. The number of active cases in the district stood at 7979, it said. (PTI)

The count of COVID-19 cases in Nashik district of Maharashtra crossed the 26,000-mark and rose to 26,774 on Wednesday with the single-day addition of 864 new patients, health officials said. The virus claimed 15 more lives, which took the death toll in the district to 728, they said. Of these, seven were from areas within Nashik Municipal Corporation (NMC) limits, six from rural parts, one from Malegaon town and one outside the district who was receiving treatment here. So far, 22,043 patients have been discharged following their recovery from the infection. Of these, 1,197 recovered on Wednesday.

To keep the rise of coronavirus cases in Surat in check, the Surat Municipal Corporation (SMC) has deployed teams of health officials at three entry and exit points of the city to screen citizens travelling to and from Surat. Teams of the civic body have also been deployed at another two entry and exit points on Olpad and Navsari routes.

Till date, the SMC has registered a total of 14,436 positive cases of coronavirus in Surat. Of these, 583 patients have died while 11,736 patients were discharged after reporting complete recovery, from private as well as municipal and state government hospitals in Surat.

The Covid-19 tally in India continued to surge even though several indicators have begun to suggest that an improvement in the situation might just be round the corner in India. On Thursday, the number of cases rose to 2,836,925 after 69,652 fresh cases were registered within a span of 24 hours. The death toll also increased to 53,866 while the recoveries stood at 2,096,664.

The decision of junior colleges to admit students under the minority quota is entirely the prerogative of the institutes and the recent guidelines introduced by the state department of school education are an encroachment on the rights of such institutes, the Maharashtra Association of Minority Educational Institutions said on Wednesday.

In a letter to the director of school education, association secretary Sunil Mantri said that the online process for admissions to first-year junior colleges (FYJC) needs urgent attention. The new rules have made it mandatory for the students to not only register on the online government portal but also on the college website. Read More

Hello and welcome to our Maharashtra coronavirus LIVE blog. With Maharashtra reporting 13,165 COVID-19 cases on Wednesday, the total number of infections in the state rose to 6,28,642, while 346 fresh deaths pushed the toll beyond the 21,000-mark. Also, the discharge of 9,011 patients on the same day took the tally of recovered coronavirus patients to 4,46,881. At present, there are 1,60,413 active cases in the state, and as many as 33,37, 848 people have been tested so far.