India

Mumbai, May 24 (PTI) All the 274 personnel who were on board barge P305 that sank and tugboat Varaprada that went adrift during Cyclone Tauktae fury have been accounted for with the recovery of 16 bodies along Maharashtra and Gujarat coasts, the Navy said on Monday.

Chandigarh, May 23 (PTI) The district authorities here stepped up security ahead of a farmers' protest on Monday.

Farmers had given a call for the protest after the state police booked over 300 of them in connection with a violent clash in the district last Sunday.

Police had lobbed tear gas shells and used force to disperse a group of farmers who had tried to march towards the venue where Chief Minister Manohar Lal Khattar had gone to inaugurate a COVID hospital.

Coimbatore, May 23 (PTI) Tamil Nadu on Sunday received four Oxygen Express trains from Odisha, carrying a total of 254.56 metric tonnes of the life saving gas.

The trains arrived in the state on Sunday afternoon, a Southern Railway release said.

Three Oxygen Express trains reached the Inland Container Depot in Chennai.

Another train from Rourkela chugged into Madukkarai near Coimbatore.

Till date, 1024.18 MT of oxygen has been delivered to the state, it said.

Jhansi, May 23 (PTI) Some junior doctors of a college were stopped from meeting Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath during a review meeting here on Sunday, with senior officials saying this was done to ensure there was no disruption during the meet.

The doctors were from the Jhansi Medical College and they wanted to submit to the chief minister a memorandum which included that the institute's central library be kept open for 24 hours, sources said.

New Delhi/Chandigarh, May 23 (PTI) Lockdown was extended on Sunday in Delhi, Haryana, Rajasthan and Puducherry, with many states already imposing COVID-induced restrictions till May-end to rein in the spread of infection and the mounting deaths which crossed the three lakh mark.

Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal announced that the ongoing lockdown in the national capital will continue for another week and said the process of "unlock" will start from May 31 in a phased manner if the number of COVID-19 cases continues to decline.

Mumbai, May 24 (PTI) The Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation has stopped new admissions of COVID-19 patients at three jumbo facilities in the city till June 1 due to pre-monsoon repair work, the BMC said on Monday.

Most of the patients from these facilities, located at the Bandra-Kurla Complex, Dahisar and Mulund, were shifted to other hospitals before cyclone Tauktae, Dr Rajesh Dere, dean of the jumbo COVID-19 centre at the BKC, said.

Srinagar, May 24 (PTI) The Jammu and Kashmir administration on Monday declared black fungus (Mucormycosis) an epidemic in the state.

A notification regarding the same was issued by Health and Medical Education Department of the Union Territory under Section 2 of the Epidemic Disease Act 1897.

This comes few days after the Centre directed all the states and UTs to make black fungus a notifiable disease.

Patna, May 24 (PTI) The Nitish Kumar government in Bihar on Monday extended till June 01 the COVID-induced lockdown that has been in force for nearly a month and was to be effective till Tuesday.

An announcement to this effect was made by the Chief Minister on his official twitter handle.

Bhubaneswar/Kolkata, May 24 (PTI) A deep depression over the Bay of Bengal has intensified into cyclonic storm 'Yaas' and is likely to cross the Odisha-West Bengal coasts on May 26 after turning into a very severe cyclonic storm, the MeT Department said on Monday.

'Yaas' is likely to cross the Odisha-West Bengal coasts between Paradip and Sagar Islands around noon on May 26 as a very severe cyclonic storm with wind speeds of 155-165 kmph, Kolkata's Regional Meteorological Centre Deputy Director Sanjib Bandopadhyay said.

NEW DELHI (AP) — India crossed another grim milestone Monday of more than 300,000 people lost to the coronavirus as a devastating surge of infections appeared to be easing in big cities but was swamping the poorer countryside.

The milestone, as recorded by India’s health ministry, comes as slowed vaccine deliveries have marred the country’s fight against the pandemic, forcing many to miss their shots, and a rare but fatal fungal infection affecting COVID-19 patients has worried doctors.