Stalin takes charge; advises admin on Covid-19 preventive measures

Stalin takes charge; advises admin on Covid-19 preventive measures

Security Arrangements Stepped Up

Julie.Mariappan@timesgroup.com

Chennai:04.05.2021

DMK president and chief minister-elect M K Stalin on Monday took charge, literally, holding a review meeting with the administrative machinery-led by chief secretary Rajeev Ranjan on Covid-preventive measures. The meeting lasted an hour at his Chittaranjan Salai residence in Teynampet at noon.

Senior bureaucrats, Atulya Misra (revenue), J Radhakrishnan (health) and K Phanindra Reddy (commissioner for revenue administration), and health officials briefed Stalin on the Covid situation. “I had a consultative meeting with the officials on the measures to contain the spread of the virus. I advised the officials that all necessary measures must be taken up in full swing to prevent Covid-19 and upgrade treatment,” Stalin said in a statement. He told the officials to make available the anti-viral drug, Remdesivir, in all important towns in the state, akin to distribution to private hospitals in Chennai. The administration should ensure adequate beds, oxygen and medicines given the spike in Covid cases.

According to sources, the officials briefed about the requirement of further restrictions to contain the virus as the active caseload crossed 20,000-mark and 122 fatalities recorded on Monday. “He (Stalin) was aware of the situation before being briefed. The officials explained what had been done so far and the preparedness,” said a source. On Sunday, the officials held a brief talk with the chief minister-elect on the swearing-in ceremony. The event is expected to take place in Raj Bhavan on May 7, after Stalin is elected legislature party leader by the party MLAs on Tuesday. He will stake claim to form the government soon after. In a related development, the ministers’ chambers in Secretariat were spruced up on Monday, with furniture and name boards being removed.

Meanwhile, police also stepped up security at Stalin’s residence with footfalls going high. A team of police led by an inspector of police, two sub-inspectors of police and 22 others were assigned for security. The police team will maintain surveillance roundthe-clock. That apart, 24 police personnel will position themselves at the Chittaranjan Salai-Cenotaph Road junction and on the eastern side of Stalin’s residence to monitor round the clock on a shift basis. A bomb detective and disposal squad team also scanned the vehicles arriving at Stalin’s residence.

Bureaucrats have been making a beeline to Stalin’s residence ever since the poll results indicated an edge for the DMK. All senior bureaucrats, including S Krishnan, SK Prabakar, Harmander Singh, Dayanand Kataria and Rajesh Lakhoni visited the leader and exchanged greetings on Sunday, besides scores of state government officials.

(With inputs from A Selvaraj)

ON THE HOT SEAT: M K Stalin holds meeting with senior bureaucrats at his Chittaranjan Salai residence in Teynampet on Monday

Covid case spike leads to rise in deaths

Covid case spike leads to rise in deaths

Delay In Treatment Ups Toll

TIMES NEWS NETWORK

Chennai:04.05.2021

The 122 deaths reported on Monday pushed the Covid death toll this week to 817 –a daily average of 117 – and the cumulative death toll in the state touched 14,468. The increasing number of cases is not only keeping hospitals crowded and healthcare providers over worked, but also increasing deaths, particularly in high incidence districts across the state.

When cases were increasing, in the week between March 22 and 28, the state reported an average of 1,655 cases and10 deaths every day. During that week, the average daily case fatality rate – number of deaths among the total number of people tested positive – was 0.6. Although average daily cases climbed to 8,288 in the week between April 12 and 18 along with 26 deaths, the week’s CFR dropped to 0.34 as people reached hospitals on time and sought treatment. But for two weeks after that, the state has been seeing a steady rise in the case fatality rate. Between April 19 and 25, when cases rose to 12,934 and deaths rose to 58, the weekly average of CFR rose to 0.47. In the week between April 26 and May 2, when the daily cases rose to17,875 deaths averaged to 113 and CFR was hovering around 0.63.

“Most people who come to hospitals early recover despite age and comorbid conditions,” said Government Corona Hospital director Dr K Narayanaswamy. “Delaying treatment despite having symptoms can lead to severe complications, extend hospital stay and may also be fatal,” he said. With cases going up, treatment is delayed either because they can’t find beds. Some hospitals delay treatment as they have severe shortages of drugs such as antiviral remdesivir.

Public health officials said the state reserves tertiary care beds for people who are sick, in need of oxygen and intensive care. “Others are sent to health centres, care centre or home,” he added. At at 7.30pm on Monday, the state website showed only six of the 1,766 oxygen beds and none of the 919 ICU beds in the five government tertiary care hospitals were vacant. The situation was similar in several private hospitals.

In the past seven days, Chennai, the most affected district, has reported 255 deaths, including 38 on Monday. Every day, Chennai, has been reporting an average of 36 deaths. “The situation can become worse in tier-II cities and towns if cases continue increase,” says a senior epidemiologist.

Octogenarian dies of cardiac arrest minutes after wife’s death

Octogenarian dies of cardiac arrest minutes after wife’s death

TIMES NEWS NETWORK

Chennai:04.05.2021

A 86-year-old man died of cardiac arrest minutes after his wife passed away on Sunday night at their house in Thiruvottiyur.

Police said Thangappan, a retired private company employee, and Visalakshi, 76, lived by themselves in the house. Thangappan had been caring for his ailing wife who was bedridden for the past three days.

On Sunday night, her health condition deteriorated and she died after drinking some water Thangappan gave her. Thangappan, who had just returned from a pharmacy, tried to wakeher up and called out to neighbours for help.

Police said by the time his neighbours got home, Thangappan too had collapsed and was found dead next to Visalakshi. The neighbours rushed him to a private hospital where doctors declared that he was brought dead. Police later said doctors said Thangappan had suffered a cardiac arrest.

Neighbours, during inquiry, told police that the couple were inseparable and went on morning walks together. They stopped stepping out due to the pandemic and took all precautions, they told police. Police did not register any case as there was no suspicion in the deaths.

Common admission season for all courses needed: Experts

Common admission season for all courses needed: Experts

Ragu.Raman@timesgroup.com

Chennai:04.05.2021

Educationists and academicians demand a common admission window for all courses to avoid delay in admissions and seat wastage every year. At present, admissions to arts, science courses, medical, engineering, veterinary and other courses are being held separately from June to October.

Arts and science colleges, which have early intake, witness huge dropouts after admissions to professional courses and even top engineering colleges are seeing up to 500 vacant seats after medical and dental counselling. Colleges feel a common admissions schedule can bring down the number of seats left vacant every year.

“Having different statutory bodies and admissions at different times is a great disadvantage for arts and science colleges,” said Thomas Amirtham, principal of Loyola College. “Arts and science colleges complete the admission process by July or August. But students discontinue their courses in September or October saying they got admissions to engineering, dental or agriculture courses. By that time, arts and science universities wrap up admissions and the seats these students give up are left vacant,” he said, adding that admissions could be done in a two to three months window for all courses.

Every year, after the medical counselling and veterinary counselling, around 300 seats from Anna University’s four campuses are left vacant. These seats cannot be filled after the counselling process.

Students and parents are also financially affected as many colleges do not reimburse the first sem fees paid to secure the admission.

“It is always good to have a national-level calendar of events for academic institutions. It will help students aspiring to join institutions across the country to plan,” said S P Thyagarajan, former vice-chancellor of University of Madras. “Due to the pandemic, there could be delays in admissions as Class XII exams have been postponed. It is better to have national-level scheduling to avoid confusion,” he said.

Deemed universities wanted Joint Seat Allocation Authority (JoSAA) counselling for IITs and centrally funded technical institutions to be restricted to just four rounds. “Setting admission calendar with eight rounds of JoSAA, which constitutes only 5% of engineering seats in the country, jeopardizes the remaining 95% as many seats fall vacant after the admission process is over,” said S Vaidyasubramaniam, vice-chancellor of SASTRA.

Anna University former vice-chancellor E Balagurusamy, however, had a different view and said a common academic window for all courses at all India level is not necessary. “All centralised institutions such as IITs, NITs, central universities may have a common admission schedule while other institutions can have a schedule at state level,” he said.

Arts and science colleges complete the admission process by July or August. But students discontinue their courses in September or October saying they got admissions to engineering, dental or agriculture courses

THOMAS AMIRTHAM

Principal Loyola College

Textile Shops Crowded; No Masks, Physical Distancing

Wedding frenzy ups Covid risk in Kanchi

Textile Shops Crowded; No Masks, Physical Distancing

TIMES NEWS NETWORK

Chennai:04.05.2021

The wedding season is set to begin in about a week and sari showrooms in Kancheepuram are seeing huge crowds, triggering fears of a Covid-19 cluster.

The district administration sealed four shops last week, but government-run stores and private establishments were packed on Monday when the district reported 835 fresh cases of Covid-19. At one store, hundreds of people entered as soon as it opened and resulted in chaos on Gandhi Road.

In October 2020, Kumaran Silks in Chennai was sealed after a video emerged showing a massive crowd inside violating distancing rules. The same month, a showroom in Salem was sealed after its inaugural offer of saris for just ₹23 each, and shirts and ‘veshtis’ for ₹20 each brought in multitudes of shoppers.

In Kancheepuram, little has changed. While shops measuring more than 3,000sqft remain shut, smaller ones are letting in more than 100 people at a time. “Families come in groups of not less than 20 members, as it is the practice to invite close relatives to select a sari for the bride. Sometimes they argue and we don’t want to forgo a customer,” said Shankar Das, who runs a showroom in Kancheepuram. Most customers buy saris in bulk and the bridal sari costs not less than ₹1 lakh, says he.

Fears of an imminent ‘complete lockdown’ are also driving people to shops. “Our wedding is planned in August, but we are rushing now as we fear there might be a complete lockdown,” said Sharadha of Vellore.

Most shopkeepers fail to adhere to safety protocols, saying it is difficult to communicate to customers while wearing masks.

Kancheepuram collector R Mageswari said many shops had closed down. “We are keeping an eye on those violating the norms. The public should realise the seriousness of the pandemic and cooperate.”

CLUSTER IN THE MAKING?

House help lose jobs as employers fear Covid spread

House help lose jobs as employers fear Covid spread

Aditi.R@timesgroup.com

Chennai:04.05.2021

Domestic workers in the city have yet again begun losing their jobs as employers fear they could bring Covid-19 infections into their homes. The workers, who mostly struggle to make ends meet, are now left in the lurch without a source of income or assistance from authorities.

“My employer did not even let me into the house, she turned me away. She said I must only return after all of us take both two doses of vaccine for Covid-19,” said T Janaki, a domestic worker in Virugambakkam. Janaki, who worked in four houses in the locality, was relayed the same message by all her employers. “I have no job and have to make do with the savings as long as I can,” she said.

T R Padma, a worker from Ashok Nagar, also had to stop going to work due to Covid-19. “I am more worried about my children’s education. I am not sure of how I will be able to afford their education, now that classes have gone online the cost has also increased. I had applied for an education loan last year but I am yet to receive a response. I have requested a few people to help me,” she said.

Like last year, most domestic workers have to now depend on personal savings and borrowings to make ends meet and the lack of communication from the labour department is adding to their woes. Since January 2020, the department has stopped accepting new pension and other welfare measure applications from unorganised workers, domestic workers included.

“No worker who has applied for welfare benefits last year has received anything, no education loan, no amount to compensate for injuries, nothing at all. They used up their savings and were left in dire straits during the lockdown last year, this pattern will repeat this year too if the department doesn’t intervene,” said R Geetha, advisor to the Unorganised Workers Federation.

When contacted, a senior official from the labour department acknowledged the issues. “We have taken note of all grievances that have reached us and we are addressing them,” said a senior official from the department.

The state labour department too stopped accepting fresh applications for pension, welfare scheme in January 2020

Meme creators have a field day with TN election results

Meme creators have a field day with TN election results

Komal.Gautham@timesgroup.com

Chennai:04.05.2021

From the moment counting began on Sunday for the Tamil Nadu assembly elections, meme creators have been on fire. For them, the weekend’s events had given enough ammunition to release a salvo of shots against both the losing politicians as well as their favourite IPL team Chennai Super Kings who had just lost to the Mumbai Indians a day before the election results were announced.

Among the first in the line of fire was MNM leader Kamal Haasan, who featured in a meme showing a picture of Faf Du Plessis of the CSK, dropping MI batsman Pollard’s catch next to a photo of him, seated dejected at the counting centre, watching his votes slip away in Coimbatore south constituency, and a heartbreak symbol between the two. The meme though scored 40,000 likes within a few hours.

Gautham Govindaraman, Founder and CEO, Chennai Memes, says they kept their jokes ready a day earlier, taking into account all possible scenarios. “As the results for the Coimbatore South constituency were delayed, we created memes for both outcomes,” he says.

“When exit polls were declared, we had an idea about what the results were likely to be. We had our team working on them since then,” says Gautham.

Some of the most popular memes on election result day included ones on MK Stalin’s victory, Udhayanidhi Stalin winning Chepauk, Khusboo losing Thousand Lights constituency, and O Panneerselvam and Edappadi K Palaniswami’s (EPS) reactions to the results.

Among the trending memes of the day was a short clip from the movie ‘Annamalai’, in which Rajinikanth (MK Stalin) walks towards the conference meeting and Sarath Babu (EPS) gives way to him.

Another meme features a smiling EPS with the caption, “I have passed everyone (students), but you have failed me (in the election)”, referring to his announcement earlier this year declaring that all students were promoted to the next grade on account of the pandemic.

Actor Rajnikanth seemed to feature in several of the memes. One in particular showed him with his hands above his head and the tagline, ‘Thankfully I escaped’, referring to the superstar’s constant dithering about joining politics.

However, meme creators say one has to be careful not to offend while creating memes. “It is a very thin line and one cannot go overboard,” says a meme creator.

COMIC RELIEF: A meme of Rajinikanth says “Thank God, I escaped.” (Left) A meme in which Dhanush asks Seeman,“If testing times are rare, it's fine, but all the time?”