Gujarat Covid tally crosses 50,000, Bhavnagar, Rajkot emerge concerns

Two other larger districts with municipal corporation areas – Bhavnagar and Rajkot – are rapidly adding new cases. The two districts added a combined 100 cases on Tuesday, even as Additional Chief Secretary of Gujarat Revenue Department, Pankaj Kumar, who has been specially appointed to monitor the coronavirus operations in the state, took a tour of Rajkot and expressed his satisfaction with the district’s preparedness. Kumar was informed that Rajkot Covid hospital has a capacity of 512 beds and in the case of exigency, can be expanded to 250 more beds.

Rajkot at present has 650 patients undergoing treatment and Bhavnagar has another 500 patients being treated for Covid-19.

Vadodara’s death toll rose to 65 with two more succumbing to the infection on Tuesday, while 75 more cases took the tally in this district to 3,757.

Veteran BJP leader and former president of Dahod municipality, Nalin Modhiya, passed away at a private hospital in Dahod on Tuesday morning as a suspected case of Covid-19. The 65-year-old was a five-term councillor of the Dahod municipality until he lost the local elections in 2015.

Modhiya, who beat cancer two years ago, developed coronavirus-like symptoms, including breathing issues, two days ago and was rushed to the hospital.

According to officials of the district administration, Modhiya’s Covid-19 sample was sent for retesting and the reports are awaited. Officials did not confirm if he tested positive for Covid-19 in the first test.

Modhiya, who was known as “Mama” locally, was among the five founding members of the BJP in Dahod and was also elected as the president of the municipality on two occasions – 1997-’98 and 2003-’04.

A day after BJP MLA from Savli Assembly constituency in Vadodara, Ketan Inamdar, tested positive for Covid-19, his teenage son also tested positive and was hospitalised. Samples of six members of Inamdar’s close family members were collected after he had tested positive on Monday.

Two districts with corporation areas – Gandhinagar and Junagadh – have shown an anomalous trend of reporting more cases from its rural jurisdiction compared to its municipal corporation limits, for the most part of this month. Gandhinagar added 31 cases, 19 of which were reported from the rural limits. Junagadh saw 12 others test positive, seven of them from the rural limits.