Senior IAS officials Gaurav Gupta and Rakesh Singh took charge as the Bruhat Bengaluru Mahanagara Palike’s (BBMP) Chief Commissioner and Administrator respectively here on Thursday.
The State government had issued an order relieving N. Manjunath Prasad as Commissioner. Mr. Singh relieved Mr. Gupta as Administrator of the civic body.
Soon after being handed the silver baton to signify the change of guard, Mr. Gupta told reporters that his appointment comes with more responsibilities. “The Commissioner is the executive head of the BBMP. He/ she has an important role to play in utilising all available resources to solve issues of the city,” he said. He also said that during his seven-month tenure as Administrator in the BBMP, he has seen closely the issues plaguing the city and issued directions to officials concerned on solving several of them.
The spike in COVID-19 positive cases will have to be reined in, Mr. Gupta said and appealed to citizens to not let their guard down and follow COVID-19 appropriate behaviour. “While we have already put in place several measures to contain the spread, citizens must cooperate and avoid crowded places.”
Responding to a question on Bengaluru Karaga, he said the government had already imposed restrictions on social/ cultural gatherings, protests etc. “We will take a call on how it can be celebrated later.”
Mr. Singh, after taking charge, said the focus would now be on two issues – spike in COVID-19 positive cases and preparing for the upcoming monsoon months.
Later, Mr. Prasad attributed the spike in cases in the city to the second wave in neighbouring Kerala and Maharashtra and increase in weddings, protests and various socio-cultural events/ programmes. The cases increased from an average 243 in February to almost 1,500 in March.
“The earlier strategy of ‘Test-Track-Treat’ will continue, as per government’s directions. From an average daily testing of 20,000 in February, the daily average now is around 60,000 a day. The way to break the chain of spread is to increase testing to detect positive cases, isolate them and intensify contact tracing,” he said.
An analysis of positive cases over the past month had shown that infection was more among citizens aged between 20 years and 40 years, while the death rate was high among those aged between 60 years and 80 years. “Despite an increase in positive cases, mortality rate is not as bad as it was last year. That apart, following the spike, there will be a graded increase in bed allocation for COVID-19 patients in private health facilities, starting with 10% this week.”
With regard to vaccinations, he said the during the interaction with 250 private hospitals on Wednesday, some had sought more vaccinations, adding that more session sites would be created. That apart, the government had also decided to allow vaccination in health sub-centres, such as health centres in industries. “This will help us achieve upto 1.5 lakh vaccinations a day,” he added.