Maharashtra Chief Minister Uddhav Thackeray will chair a meeting on Thursday with COVID-19 Task Force to assess the present situation in the state.
The state has been reporting a steady decline in the number of daily covid cases. Therefore the state government is planning to relax the lockdown restrictions.
The state government has imposed strict restrictions that included complete weekend lockdown, across the state to curb covid spread.
As per a report in HT, the state government is planning to allow shops to remain open for longer periods. At present, shops and commercial establishments are permitted to remain open till 4 pm on weekdays.
"The government can give some relaxations as cases have stabilised. However, at the same time, strict monitoring should be followed daily for various aspects like daily cases, positivity rates, bed occupancy as well as liquid-oxygen consumption," said Dr Subhash Salunkhe, advisor to the state on COVID-19 management, as quoted by the report.Further he stated that local train services must be allowed in a staggered manner and preference can be given to fully vaccinated people."There should be strict enforcement of COVID-19 appropriate behaviour," he said.
Maharashtra Cabinet Minister Aslam Shaikh on Wednesday hinted that fully vaccinated passengers could be permitted to travel unrestricted in suburban train services within two to three days.
Maharashtra reported 6,857 new coronavirus infections and 286 fresh fatalities on Wednesday, taking the tally of cases to 62,82,914 and the death toll to 1,32,145, a state health department official said. Maharashtra's coronavirus recovery rate now stands at 96.53 per cent, while the fatality rate is 2.01 per cent.