other states

14-day quarantine for all NoRKs

08/05/2020, SPECIAL CORRESPONDENT ,THIRUVANANTHAPURAM

Non Resident Keralites (NoRKs) returning to the State with COVID-19 negative certificate will have to undergo seven-day institutional quarantine and seven-day home quarantine even if they test negative after institutional quarantine.

Revised orders

Those testing positive for COVID-19 after seven days will be shifted to a designated hospital as per the revised orders issued by the Department of Non-Resident Keralite Affairs (NoRKA) on Thursday.

To home district

Those being shifted to an institutional quarantine identified by the government will be sent to their home district from the four international airports where they arrive.

The District Collectors will arrange the transport facility to the district concerned, according to an official release issued here on Thursday.

NEET 2020

Aspirants for PG clinical courses shocked by fee hike

Information made public two days before exercising web options

08/05/2020, K SHIVA SHANKER,HYDERABAD

MBBS graduates who are aspiring for a post graduate seat (PG) in Telangana demanded that the hike in course fee at private medical colleges to be rolled back. Telangana Junior Doctors Association (TJUDA) and Healthcare Reforms Doctors Association (HRDA), who are spearheading their cause, questioned the rationale behind increasing the fee by over 100% for clinical courses. Along with miscellaneous costs, the total fee for three years is up to ₹ 30 lakh for clinical courses under Competent Authority quota.

Vice Chancellor of Kaloji Narayana Rao University of Health Sciences (KRUHS) B. Karunakar Reddy said that Telangana Admission and Fee Regulation Committee (TAFRC) had taken into consideration the audited income and expenditure statements submitted by private medical colleges before deciding the fee structure.

While pursuing MBBS course, medicos take National Eligibility Entrance Test (NEET) to qualify for counselling for PG seats. There are 2044 PG seats in clinical and non-clinical courses in Telangana — 887 in government medical colleges and the rest in private medical colleges. Further, the seats are divided into Category A (Competent Authority quota), Category B (Management quota), and Category C (NRI quota).

The issue emerged when Telangana Health and Family Welfare Department issued a government order which states that fee under convenor seats for Clinical courses at private medical colleges would range between ₹ 7 lakh to ₹ 7.75 lakh per annum. It was only ₹ 3.5 lakh last year. This is over 100% increase. The new fee structure is approved based on recommendation by TAFRC.

“Many students, especially from poor and middle class backgrounds cannot afford this fee structure,” HRDA president K. Mahesh Kumar said.

The KNRUHS Vice Chancellor said that the private medical colleges agreed to abide by Medical Council of India (MCI) rules to pay stipend, which is around ₹ 6 lakh (due for revision) per annum.

‘Re-audit financials’

TJUDA president K. U. N. Vishnu requested authorities concerned to re-audit the financial data submitted by private medical colleges to TAFRC. They met State Health Minister Eatala Rajender with a request to revoke the order hiking the fee.

A few aspirants said that the Government Order dated April 14 was made public only on May 4 — two days before exercising web options for counselling. “All of us were prepared only for ₹ 3.5 lakh. Some worked hard, saved the money. But they were in for a rude shock on May 4 when they learnt that the fee was increased to ₹ 7 lakh. They are struggling to gather the additional amount,” said an aspirant.

Dr. Vishnu said that a few of them who were prepared for only ₹ 3.5 lakh per annum fee will be forced to let go of the seat under Category A quota if they don’t get more time, and they might end up losing a year. “We have requested our Health Minister to extend time for web options,” the TJUDA president said.

Train info

Seven more trains carry migrants

The trains are towards Bihar and Jharkhand

08/05/2020, SPECIAL CORRESPONDENT,HYDERABAD

Migrants before boarding a train at the Ghatkesar railway station.arrangement

South Central Railway braced itself up to run five or more migrant special trains past midnight of Thursday or early Friday morning, having run seven more trains — four from Telangana and three from Andhra Pradesh — in the intervening night of Wednesday and Thursday towards Bihar and Jharkhand carrying more than 7,000 passengers overall.

All the travellers were registered by the TS and AP governments and thermally screened before being brought to the railway stations in buses amid tight security. Top railway officials, who have been refusing to come on record ever since the operations had begun, informed on Thursday that the special ‘Shramik’ specials of 24 non-AC sleeper class coaches were run with each carrying about 1,200 passengers each.

Two trains started their journey from Ghatkesar towards Chapra in Bihar and Katia in Uttarakhand; two more trains began their journey from Lingampalli towards Bhagalpur in Bihar and Dhanbhad in Jharkhand — both stations are located in the eastern and western suburbs of the twin cities.

From the AP side, the trains were run from Chittoor towards Saharsa, from Nellore towards Bharauni and from Nidadavolu towards Dharabanga, all in Bihar. All these migrant special trains will be running non-stop and could take up to 24 hours and more to reach their respective destinations.

Senior railway officials stated that the passengers were provided with food and drinking water by the States before start of the journey while the railways will take care of their needs during the trip. Halts for these trains will be only when crossing divisions or zones when the running railway staff including loco-pilots, travelling ticket examiners, sanitation personnel and security persons will be replaced.

Both State governments have paid up for the cost of travel, they added. It is also learnt that in the reverse direction, a train from Maharastra had arrived in Anantapur bringing labour from there, but this was arranged by the Western Railway. Otherwise, for now the SCR trains are returning empty in the return journey from States up North.

other uniuversities

UoH faculty, staff contribute one-day’s pay

08/05/2020, SPECIAL CORRESPONDENT,HYDERABAD

Faculty and staff members of the University of Hyderabad (UoH) have contributed their one day’s salary of ₹30.74 lakh, while 204 pensioners of the university contributed an additional ₹3.59 lakh to the PM CARES Fund.

Around 1,050 persons together contributed their one day’s salary while some faculty and staff have contributed more than one day’s salary.

Meanwhile, assistant professor of School of Management Studies P. Murugan conducted an online workshop. The total fee of ₹50,500 was donated to PM CARES Fund.

Flight with Kenyans leaves RGI Airport

08/05/2020, SPECIAL CORRESPONDENT,HYDERABAD

On Thursday, Hyderabad International Airport handled one more special passenger relief flight, this time to repatriate citizens of Kenya from the city.

The Indigo Airlines flight to repatriate those who arrived from Chennai via Bangalore landed at the airport at 9.20 a.m., and departed to Mumbai at 11.02 a.m. with 83 Kenyans, out of which, 32 boarded from Hyderabad and 51 transit passengers had joined from Chennai and Bangalore.

As per the flight itinerary, the passengers were to be further airlifted by Kenyan Airways from Mumbai to their home land.

All the passengers passed through a fully-sanitised domestic terminal, which has been kept ready for evacuation operations. In coordination with the Kenyan consulate, Hyderabad and the Telangana government, Kenyan citizens started to arrive at the airport from 6 a.m. to 8 a.m. Special screening and safety measures were in place during the flight’s handling as part of COVID precautionary steps that included thermal screening and special queuing at all passenger processing points.

The RGI Airport had handled 12 evacuation flights serving over 900 foreign nationals.

Covid=19

‘Give COVID-19 results in 48 hrs or face action’

City reports one death and 448 new cases, says government

08/05/2020, STAFF REPORTER ,NEW DELHI

A worker sprays disinfectant in Laxmi Nagar on Thursday.R.V. Moorthy

The Delhi government has warned action against all COVlD-19 testing labs if they do not give results of samples collected within a maximum of 48 hours.

The warning came on a day when the city reported one death and 448 new COVID-19 cases. This is the highest single-day jump so far, said government officials. The total number of deaths stands at 66 while cases at 5,980. Of the total cases, 1,931 people have recovered and there are 3,983 active cases.

The order read: “From May 7, 2020, reports of all samples collected must be given within 24 hours and not later than 48 hours, in any case… Non-compliance of the orders will be viewed seriously and action will be taken immediately as per the provisions of the Delhi Epidemic Diseases, COVID-19, regulations, 2020 and other Rules and regulation in this regard.”

On Wednesday, Health Minister Satyendar Jain had said “thousands of pending results are coming now”.

Mr. Jain on Thursday said they were in talks with other States to send back people, who were connected to a religious gathering in Nizamuddin here in March. He added that these people, who had tested negative for COVID-19, after they completed the quarantine period, were not sent back to their States because of the lockdown till May 3.

“Under the current lockdown, stranded people can be shifted. So we are shifting them. We have sent lists of people to other States,” Mr. Jain said, adding: “COVID-19 is going to be here for a long time; it is not going to end in one or two months. We have to learn to live with it.”

New containment zones

In a related development, four more areas in the city were delisted as “containment zone” by the Delhi government on Thursday.

other states

e-token system launched to buy liquor

People will receive token on their mobile phones after filling details on Web link

08/05/2020, STAFF REPORTER,NEW DELHI

A policeman disperses a crowd outside a liquor shop during the nationwide lockdown, on Thursday. R.V. MoorthyR_V_Moorthy

In a bid to ensure social distancing and to stop overcrowding at liquor shops, the Delhi government on Thursday launched e-token system to buy liquor.

People can apply for an e-token through the link https://www.qtoken.in/. A person will have to enter his name and phone number and an e-coupon will be sent to her or his registered mobile number.

The person can then go to the nearby shop, show the e-token and buy liquor. The government said that this will help reduce overcrowding and ensure social distancing at liquor shops.

“Following the guidelines of the Central government, the Delhi government has given permission to open about 200 shops across the national capital from Monday. However, due to overcrowding and long queues in some areas, only 50 shops could be kept open. In order to curb violations of social distancing norms, crowding and law and order issues during the sale of liquor in the city, the Delhi government has decided to introduce the e-token system,” an official statement said.

The link was not working on Thursday evening and the government said that it was due to “heavy rush”. The link will start working soon. the government said.