The Delhi Metro had resumed operations on September 7 (Archive)
Mumbai:
The Maharashtra government has decided to resume subway train services starting on October 19 in a phased manner, weeks after the Center, in its Unlock4 guidelines, allowed the reopening of the rapid transit system across the country. The operation of the subway trains will relieve pressure on conventional public transportation such as local buses in Mumbai, which is the country that suffers the most from the coronavirus pandemic.
In Mumbai, only one line connecting the eastern and western suburbs of the city was in operation before the pandemic hit the country. The line, which is a fundamental part of the city’s east-west connectivity, will be operated starting next week with a strict anti-Covid standard operating procedure, mainly focusing on social distancing and the use of masks to prevent transmission of the virus.
The Delhi Metro, the country’s largest metro train network, had resumed operations on September 7, with strict protection measures against the coronavirus. Only asymptomatic people can board the trains and the stations in the containment zones are closed. Passengers were asked to download the Aarogya Setu app on their smartphones and are undergoing thermal checks at stations.
According to the guidelines, the authorities had decided to discourage transactions in cash and tokens.
Based on the August core guidelines, the metropolitan authorities of Delhi, Noida, Chennai, Kochi, Bengaluru, Jaipur, Hyderabad, Kolkata, Gujarat and Uttar Pradesh had prepared their standard operating procedures and have been running metro services since last month.
Maharashtra, the state with the most cases and deaths from coronavirus, however, had not allowed the resumption of subway trains.
Uddhav Thackeray’s government has also allowed the reopening of all state and private libraries as of Thursday. It has also enabled business-to-business exhibitions starting tomorrow outside of the containment zones.
The government of the Shiv Sena-Congress-NCP alliance is under pressure from the BJP to reopen places of worship. On Wednesday, after the party’s protest, Governor Bhagat Singh Koshyari wrote to Uddhav Thackeray “requesting that he immediately announce” the reopening of places of worship with Covid precautions.
“I wonder if they are getting some divine premonition to keep putting off reopening places of worship over and over again or if they have gone ‘secular,’ a term they hated.” wrote in the heavily worded letter.
The Chief Minister replied that his Hindutva did not require a certificate from the Governor or anyone else and that he would make a decision after careful consideration.
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