BMC scraps lockdown relaxations in Mumbai, only essential shops to stay open

A day after the Maharashtra government relaxed restrictions to allow opening of non-essential shops including liquor outlets, the Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC) on Tuesday overruled this order for Mumbai after large crowds violated social distancing norms to check the spread of Covid-19.

BMC commissioner Praveen Pardeshi, issued a circular on Tuesday stating that only groceries and medical stores will be allowed to stay open.

“There are multiple reports, news in social media and inputs received from the police and the ward officials that due to above relaxation there has been huge crowds gathering near these shops and where it has been impossible to maintain social distancing and there were few instances of law and order situation arising out of such crowds gathering at one place.”

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The circular said that while the number of positive cases in Mumbai has been rising, the “gathering of crowds in large numbers without following social distancing will be detrimental to the control of spread of virus and the advantages of the lockdown will be lost”.

Across the city, there were long queues outside wine shops that made social distancing norms difficult to maintain.

The state government on May 3 had issued an order allowing non-essential shops including liquor outlets to be opened across the state in all zones as long as they were limited to 5 shops per lane in red zones.

Red zones are so categorised based on the high number of coronavirus cases reported from here. Mumbai falls in the red zone.

The number of Covid-19 positive cases in Mumbai is likely to cross the 10,000 mark by Wednesday.

Pardeshi in the circular pointed out the relaxations were likely to deteriorate the conditions in Mumbai and hence were being withdrawn for the city.

“Hence, I issue orders to assistant municipal commissioner of wards that no such permissions for opening of the five shops which are non-essential be given and the police within each ward jurisdiction will ensure compliance of these orders in toto. Only the groceries and medical shops will be allowed to be opened,” the order said.

The BMC was earlier contemplating drafting a policy to regulate functioning of these non-essential shops by limiting certain kinds of shops and introducing odd-even opening slots for them. However, the civic commissioner ruled this out in favour of a complete ban.

Incidentally, the Mumbai collector had issued an order on May 4 to allow opening of liquor shops but Pardeshi as a BMC civic chief is also an empowered officer nominated by the state government to overrule orders of the state within the purview of the city.