Choreographer-director Farah Khan has come under some backlash after her video of buying mangoes and removing the mask to smell the fruit started doing rounds on social media. The video comes at a time when the number of coronavirus cases are surging and the country stares at a fresh wave of the virus infection. In the video, the Bollywood mogul is seen buying mangoes from a roadside cart and smells at least three of them before making the final purchase. However, the video did not go well with many of the netizens who slammed her for showing an irresponsible behaviour in times like these.
“Mask utaar ke aam kaun soonghta hai COVID time mei wo bhi Maharashtra mein !!” wrote one user, while another user pointed out, “The vendor lifted the mango in his hands, handed it over to Farah khan, she took in her hands and smelled it touching to her nose by pulling the mask down. And she touched so many mangoes and smelled them. Do people really know how the virus is really spreading?”
Meanwhile, the number of coronavirus cases are showing a steep surge in India as it recorded the highest single-day spike for this year with 47,262 cases. Maharashtra has been recording the highest number of cases among all states. Maharashtra Minister Dhananjay Munde has reportedly tested positive for coronavirus. This is for the second time that he contracted the infection, the first being in June last year.
Mumbai’s Andheri (west) has emerged as a Covid-19 hotspot, with its civic ward recording the highest number of cases among all the 24 municipal wards in the city, authorities are planning to shut down access to Juhu beach. Andheri’s daily case count currently hovers between 200 and 300, prompting civic officials to intensify the testing drive, Times of India reported on Wednesday.
Close to 300 cases were reported from the area on Monday, with the ward posting a weekly growth rate of 0.97%. “At Juhu beach we already have our clean-up marshals deployed to penalise those not wearing a face mask. From Monday onwards we also started antigen tests at the bhel plaza on the beach premises…We have also sought police bandobast in case of a law and order situation arising,” Assistant municipal commissioner Vishwas Mote was quoted by TOI as saying. On Tuesday, the tally in Mumbai rose by 3,512 to touch 3,69,426, while the day also saw eight deaths and 1,203 people getting discharged.