Covid strikes motown: 140 test positive in Bajaj Auto's Aurangabad plant

MUMBAI: Leading two- and three-wheelers maker Bajaj Auto on Friday said that two of its employees succumbed to Covid-19 and 140 others have tested positive for the infection at its plant in Aurangabad but the facility continues to function normally.
The statement comes after some media reports suggested that Bajaj Auto had to shut the plant at Waluj near Aurangabad.

"We have more than 8100 employees and contractors employed in our Waluj plant. Our current incidence of 140 cases of Covid [sic.] is less than 2 per cent of our strength," Ravi Kyran Ramasamy, chief human resources officer, Bajaj Auto said in a statement.

The two deceased had underlying conditions of hypertension and diabetes, he said, adding that operations continue normally with all necessary safety measures.

“We at Bajaj Auto, like the country at large, are now learning to live with the virus."

However, two people in the know said that the company will be shutting its plant on Saturday and Sunday for sanitisation purpose and production is expected to resume on Monday morning.

“It is possible they may shift some quantity to their Pantnagar (Uttarakhand) plant,” said one of the persons quoted above. The plant anyway used to observe a weekly off on Sunday, this person said.

Ex-Chief Minister of Maharashtra and BJP leader Devendra Fadnavis, in an apparent jibe at Bajaj Auto managing director Rajiv Bajaj, said "I pray for the well-being of all infected with COVID-19. Hope those who give sermons on Covid [sic.] management & thrive on sound bytes for partisan compulsions now understand that real life consequences are different from bravado on camera."

Bajaj had earlier criticised the Centre for hurting the economy due to extended lockdowns to contain the pandemic. The government had flattened the wrong curve, he said in an interview with opposition leader Rahul Gandhi, suggesting that the economic growth curve had been flattened due to the lockdowns instead of the coronavirus infection curve.

The manufacturing facility in question had resumed production on 24th April and the first instance of an employee testing positive for the novel coronavirus was reported June 6, the statement read. The company said that it reported all the cases to local authorities.