‘No local restrictions from today, only State Govt’s protocols to be followed’
    Date :01-Apr-2021

Cotton Market_1 &nbs
 Rush hour: With soaring mercury, people on Wednesday thronged Cotton Market to purchase
coolers as there were talks regarding complete lockdown in State. After the Government relaxed the curbs, it can be expected that such rush will reduce and people will take precautions on their own.
 
 
Staff Reporter :
 
Guardian Minister makes announcement after holding review meeting on Wednesday
 
For the first time, Guardian Minister admits that new strain of COVID-19 found in Nagpur district
 
 
Even as the State Government is facing pressure from various quarters not to resort to lockdown to contain spread of COVID-19 in Maharashtra, in case of Nagpur district it has been decided not to continue with local restrictions from Thursday. Only the State Government protocols will be implemented in a stringent manner, said Dr Nitin Raut, Guardian Minister of district. On Wednesday, Dr Raut chaired a meeting of senior officers and elected representatives, at Divisional Commissionerate here to take stock of the situation. After the review, Dr Raut admitted that new strain of COVID-19 was found in Nagpur district. This is the same strain as found in Britain, South Africa, and Brazil, he added, and asked the officials to prepare a protocol for treatment in this regard. He appealed to the people to opt for RTPCR test if they had symptoms. Also, the patients in home isolation should take special care, he added. After the meeting, talking to mediapersons, Dr Raut said that the curbs imposed by district administration till March 31 would not continue from April 1, but State Government’s guidelines would be implemented. To a question if only night curfew will remain in place, he replied, “Yes. Only the State Government’s rules will continue to operate.
 

Dr Sanjeev Kumar_1 & 
 Dr Nitin Raut, Guardian Minister, interacting with senior officers during a meeting at Divisional Commissionerate on Wednesday. Dr Sanjeev Kumar, Divisional Commissioner; Rashmi Barve, ZP President; Radhakrishnan B, Municipal Commissioner; Amitesh Kumar, CP, and others also also are seen.
 
 
From district administration, there will be no local restrictions.” This statement of the Guardian Minister immediately went viral on social media, and was interpreted as the shops would be allowed to remain open as usual, without any restriction that operated in the district for the past few days. Once the State Government issues its fresh guidelines, local administration will issue orders accordingly. Dr Raut also thanked the people for co-operation in the past few days. Testing has been ramped up, vaccination is being done at 250 centres across the district, he added. There was a drop in testing due to Holi in past couple of days, but it would regain pace, he said. Further, the vaccination for all persons above 45 years of age will commence in the district from April 1. In one-and-a-half month, the target of COVID-19 vaccination will be achieved, he said.
 
Considering the spike in COVID-19 cases in Nagpur city as well as rural areas of district for past some time, it was decided to allow shops to remain open only till 4 pm. It had invited criticism too. Many suggested that testing should be increased, contact tracing should be focussed upon, number of beds should be increased in hospitals, and also to expedite COVID-19 vaccination. Still, given the number of increase in number of new cases and daily death count staying above 50 for past some days, the local administration continued with the restrictions with an intention to reduce crowding in public places, especially markets and shops. In the meeting held at Divisional Commissionerate on Wednesday, Dr Raut said that the administration had started COVID-19 testing at 2,500 centres in the district. Already, he said, the administration had urged the Central Government to allow increasing the number of centres. To ensure better management of hospital beds, co-ordinating officers have been appointed and people also will be informed about the availability of beds, he added. He asked the Nagpur Municipal Corporation (NMC) and district administration to frame rules for patients in home isolation so that stringent action could be taken against them if they were found violating the norms.
 
As far as testing and medicines are concerned, special nodal officers should be appointed to provide information to the elected representatives, Dr Raut said. He asked the officials to appoint Tehsildar for rural areas and Deputy Collector for Nagpur city, in this regard. Rashmi Barve, President of Zilla Parishad; Dr Vikas Mahatme, Rajya Sabha Member; Girish Vyas, Adv Abhijeet Wanjari, Pravin Datke, MLCs; Vikas Kumbhare, Adv Ashish Jaiswal, Sameer Meghe, Tekchand Sawarkar, Raju Parwe, MLAs; Dr Sanjeev Kumar, Divisional Commissioner; Amitesh Kumar, Commissioner of Police; Radhakrishnan B, Municipal Commissioner; Ravindra Thakare, District Collector; Yogesh Kumhejkar, Chief Executive Officer of ZP; Jalaj Sharma, Additional Municipal Commissioner; Dr Archana Kothari, President of Indian Medical Association; senior officers of GMCH, and Task Force, attended the meeting. Plan for increasing testing, vaccination: Anil Deshmukh Anil Deshmukh, Home Minister, participated in the meeting online from Mumbai.
 
He suggested that a proper plan must be devised to increase testing in Katol, Narkhed, Saoner, Kamptee, Hingna and such areas in rural parts of the district. Also, he said, proper planning must be done to increase COVID-19 vaccination in the district. Increase vaccination centres: Fadnavis Devendra Fadnavis, Leader of Opposition in Legislative Assembly, also joined the meeting online. He stressed upon the need for increasing number of COVID-19 vaccination centres. At present, the district has 81 centres in Nagpur city and 163 in rural areas. To vaccinate six lakh persons, number of centres need to be increased. He assured to follow up the matter with Central Government. Referring to the recent incident in which two COVID-19 patients were given only one bed in a hospital, Fadnavis said that such situation highlighted the need for better patient management. City needs 500 more beds: Mayor Tiwari Dayashankar Tiwari, Mayor of the city, also was present in the meeting. He underlined the need for having 500 more beds in hospitals in Nagpur city to cater to the requirement. Besides, he said, a separate hospital should be designed for administering Remdesivir injection.