Sunburn, Goa’s biggest music and dance festival to be held this year with 20 per cent capacity
New Delhi: The State Election Commission in Kerala today informed the High Court that it was ready to conduct the local body polls by strictly adhering to the Covid-19 protocol. In its reply to the Court on a petition pleading postponement of the polls, the poll panel said that it had discussed election situation with all political parties in the state and the pre-poll arrangements were in the last phase.
The Kerala government is looking at various options on the partial reopening of schools even though the state is grappling with a rise in Covid-19 cases. The General Education Department has informed the government regarding the possibility of reopening the schools from November 15. With one more death reported in Kochi today, the Covid death toll in the state has gone up to 1513. The state recorded 7025 Covid-19 cases yesterday.
In Andhra Pradesh, though, following Centre’s guidelines for the reopening of schools and colleges, state government schools too were reopened for class 9 and 10 students in the state following Covid precautionary norms. Schools will run half day classes on alternate days in three phases. However, the corporate and private schools did not open.
Both Andhra and Telangana also agreed to restore inter-state bus services with Telangana after seven months, and movie theatres in Vijayawada and Visakhapatnam too resumed after seven months. Arrangements were being made to run three shows a day. Multiplexes will run on cashless transactions with paperless tickets. Seating arrangements were made with 50 per cent occupancy in all theatres.
However, in Goa, the state’s biggest music and dance festival – Sunburn will be held this year with only 20 per cent capacity. It will be held on the Vagator Beach in North Goa between December 27-29, just after the Christmas. The organisers have put out protocols to be followed during the festival, including a limited capacity and minimal contact entry. The overall response this year has been lukewarm due to Covid pandemic.
In Mumbai, free COVID-19 testing facilities will be available for Mumbaikars from today at 244 places under the jurisdiction of Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC) daily between 10 am to 12 noon on a ‘walk-in’ basis. Some of these places will have RT PCR method medical testing facilities while the rest will have antigen-based medical testing facilities. There are already 54 private medical laboratories in the BMC area which provide COVID-19 testing facilities as per the revised government rates. Maharashtra reported 5,633 new cases on Sunday and the active cases in state now are 1.25 lakhs. The state has conducted more than 90.24 lakh Covid tests so far.
– globalbihari bureau
