Prompted by the emerging health situation in Maharashtra where 11 persons have so far tested positive for Covid-19, the MVA Government on Wednesday evening decided curtail the ongoing Budget Session of Maharashtra Legislature by a week. The session will now end on Saturday.
Addressing a hurriedly called news conference at the Vidhan Bhavan here in the evening, Maharashtra Chief Minister Uddhav Thackeray said: “ In the normal course, the Budget session was to end on 20 March but now it would end on Saturday. We have decided to curtail the situation as a precautionary measure”.
However, Deputy Chief Minister Ajit Pawar – who is the guardian Minister of Pune (where eight positive cases have been reported) said that there was no reason for people to panic. "Because of the Budget session, a lot of officers are in Mumbai. But, we want the officers at the field level," Pawar said.
Uddhav and Ajit Pawar made an announcement about the curtailment of the Budget session after held a meeting with Assembly Speaker Nana Patole, Council Chairman Ramraje Naik-Nimbalkar, Leader of Opposition in Assembly Devendra Fadnavis and his counterpart in Council Praveen Darekar on the need for curtailing the budget session of the State
legislature.
"There was consensus among all parties about the need for curtailing of session. All the same, we wanted consent from both the Houses. Parliamentary Affairs Minister Anil Parab will table resolutions seeking curtailment in Assembly and Council in this regard. After that the resolutions passed in both Houses would be sent to Governor Bhagat Singh Koshyari requesting him to prorogue the budget the ongoing legislature session on Saturday,” the deputy chief minister said.
Queried if the schools and colleges in the state would be shut down in the state, Uddhav said: “There appears to be no immediate need to shut down schools and colleges in the state and the situation would be monitored before taking the final decision”.
On the possibility of the State Government asking the IPL management to relook at the IPL tournament schedule, Uddhav said: "We are of the opinion that there should not be any crowd. We have heard that IPL organisers have said that there could be matches without spectators... but we are yet to hear from them officially."
Meanwhile, the Chief Minister confirmed that 11 positive cases of Coronavirus have been detected in the State. Of the total 11 positive cases, eight are from Pune, two from Mumbai. In a late night development, a Nagpur-based man tested positive for coronavirus infection.
Uddhav appealed to people across the State not to panic. “Just because some people have been tested positive for Covid-19 does not mean that the people should panic. But, there is definitely a need to take all precautions which we are taking.
“A group of 40 Indian tourists from Maharashtra that returned from an international tour on March 1.
Nine tourists showed symptoms of Coronavirus. Of them, eight have been tested positive in Pune. We are trying to locate 30 others who were part of the tourists,” Uddhav said.
In a related development, two Mumbai patients are currently undergoing treatment in an isolated ward in Kasturba Hospital after their test reports were received today.
“The tour members hailed from different parts of Maharashtra and now warlike efforts are underway to trace them and implement the necessary measures,” an official of Communicable Diseases Control Programme said.
Meanwhile, as many as 138,968 passengers have been screened till today (March 11) at the three international airports in Mumbai, Pune and Nagpur.
Besides, as per revised rules of the Centre, all passengers arriving from Iran, South Korea and Italy are being notified to the Bureau of Immigation. From February 29 till date, a total of 635 passengers from these affected countries have landed in Maharashtra.
Since Jan. 18, 349 people with suspected Coronavirus symptoms were admitted to various hospitals in the state of which 312 have tested negative so far and discharged after completing their 14-day quarantine.
Currently, 18 suspected Covind-19 patients are still in Pune hospitals and 15 in Mumbai hospitals whose test reports are awaited besides Coronavirus suspects in government hospitals in Nagpur and Pimpri-Chinchwad.