COVID: Maharashtra shuts all public places, malls, hotels from 8 PM to 7 AM till April 15

With Maharashtra hitting COVID-19 peaks daily, Maharashtra govt on Saturday, issued strict guidelines under its 'Mission Begin Again' directive, enforcing a curfew from 8 PM to 7 AM throughout the state till April 15. Under the new guidelines, all public places, Cinema halls, malls, auditoriums and restaurants will remain shut from 8 PM to 7 AM. At present, there are 2,62,685 active cases in the state, with 22,83,037 recoveries and 53,795 fatalities.

Mission Begin Again directives:

• Gathering of 5 or more not allowed from 8 PM to 7 AM effective 27 March midnight. Violation will attract Rs 1000 fine
• All public places (Gardens & Beaches) to remain shut from 8 PM to 7 AM effective 27 March midnight. Violation will attract Rs 1000 fine.
• All Cinema halls, malls, auditoriums and restaurants to remain shut from 8 PM to 7 AM effective 27 March midnight. Home delivery and takeaway will be allowed. Any violation will attract cinema halls/hotels/restaurants to be closed for a period until the COVID-19 pandemic stays notified as a disaster by the Central govt.
• All social/political/religious gatherings are banned
• Cap of 50 people allowed for weddings & 20 for funerals
• All offices except health & essential capped at 50% capacity
• RT-PCR testing should be scaled up to 70% or more

Already, districts like Amaravati, Yavatmal and Latur have been put already under restrictions and Nagpur has been put under lockdown till the month-end.

COVID-19 crisis in Maharashtra

For the second day in a row, Maharashtra crossed its previous highest one-day spike in COVID-19 cases with 35,952 more persons testing positive on Thursday. This propelled the state's COVID-19 tally to 26,00,833. At present, there are 2,62,685 active cases in the state. With 20,444 COVID-19 patients discharged in the day, the number of recovered soared to 22,83,037. 111 deaths were reported on Thursday. Out of the total deaths reported in the day, 66 occurred in the last 48 hours, 28 in the last week and the rest from the period before.

Until now, a total of 53,795 persons in the state have died owing to COVID-19. So far, 1,88,78,754 samples have been tested for the novel coronavirus in labs operational across the state. While 13,62,899 persons are under home quarantine, 13,770 others have been admitted to institutional quarantine centres. The COVID-19 positivity rate, recovery rate and fatality rate in Maharashtra stand at 13.78 per cent, 87.78 per cent and 2.07 per cent respectively.