QKolkata: 18-Yr-Old Back From UK Tests Positive for Corona & More

Your daily lowdown on all things Kolkata.

An 18-year-old in Kolkata has tested positive for coronavirus. Image used for representational purposes only.

(Photo: PTI)

1. Calcutta Teenager Back From UK Tests Positive For Virus

An 18-year-old student who returned to Calcutta from the UK tested positive for COVID-19 on Tuesday, 17 March, becoming the first such confirmed patient in Bengal, the state health department said.

The first result sent Nabanna, the state secretariat, into a tizzy. The state government is trying to verify reports that the patient is the son of a bureaucrat who may have had contact with senior officials at Nabanna before her son’s condition was confirmed, multiple sources said on Tuesday night.

The government is also looking into reports of whether the bureaucrat used influence to get the student past the screening layers at the city airport either late on Sunday night or early Monday morning.

The student would have been isolated only if he had shown any symptoms. Health Department officials said the teenager, who was stated to be stable on Tuesday night, was asymptomatic.

(Source: The Telegraph)

2. Corona Lockdown Fear Sets Off Panic Buying Of Staple Items

News of convenience stores in COVID-19 affected cities in India and abroad running out of essential staples and groceries has triggered panic buying in Kolkata with customers making bulk purchase fearing a shutdown of stores.

Branded standalone grocery stores in the city are seeing an unprecedented rush from the first hour itself. People are queueing up, waiting for the stores to open, so that they can pick up essential supplies before stocks are exhausted. Store employees say they are witnessing an unprecedented rush for foodgrains and essentials with people wanting to stock up for at least two months.

(Source: The Times Of India)

3. No Tolly Shooting Till 30 March

Though the news of complete shutdown of shooting in Tollywood till 30 March has come as a big jolt to producers, all stakeholders agree that it is an unavoidable and necessary step in the current circumstances. With scant episode banks of megaserials, tele serial addicts will now have to make do with repeat telecast of their favourite soaps.

Minister Arup Biswas told TOI, “We have asked shooting to be stalled till March 30. I have no estimate of the financial losses. All I can say is the value of an individual’s life is greater than any financial loss.” When Biswas was asked if shutdown orders were meant for post-production units too, he said, “The objection is against mass gatherings.”

Meanwhile, actress Pallavi Chatterjee has mooted the idea of organizing a charity show with stars once work resumes. “We can do this to raise funds for the daily wage-earners of our industry,” Chatterjee said.

(Source: The Times Of India)

4. Mausam Set To Enter RS, But Bajaj Out Of Fray

The Election Commission of India on Tuesday accepted the Rajya Sabha nomination of the Trinamool Congress’s Mausam Benazir Noor, but rejected that of Independent Dinesh Bajaj.

The commission had on Monday decided not to accept the nominations of Noor and Bajaj when the Left Front had pointed out alleged irregularities in their documents.

The commission held on Tuesday held a hearing where Noor’s nomination was cleared and Bajaj’s candidature rejected. The Trinamool leader said,

“My nomination was cancelled as my affidavit was not duly notarised…. I did everything I was told to, but my nomination was cancelled. I will take instructions from my supreme leader (Mamata Banerjee) on my future course of action.”

Dinesh Bajaj

(Source: The Telegraph)

5. ‘Gaumutra’ Lands Cop In Hospital, Local BJP Organiser Behind Bars

A 34-year-old home guard, who had his first sip of cow urine in a north Kolkata neighbourhood on Monday, was admitted to hospital on Tuesday after he complained of vomiting and nausea. But Pintu Pramanik did not let that come in the way of his duty. He filed a complaint from his hospital bed against the BJP functionary who “induced” him to drink the gaumutra— as “prasad and preventive medicine” against COVID-19 — following which cops arrested Narayan Chatterjee on Tuesday.

The hospitalisation and the arrest capped a bizarre chain of events that played itself out over 22 hours in a neighbourhood a few kilometres northwest of College Street, the cradle of Bengal Renaissance that stamped out social evils like widow-burning from nineteenth-century Calcutta and Bengal.

(Source: The Times Of India)