No Decision Yet On Reopening Of Schools In Mumbai: Mayor Kishori Pednekar

Mumbai: Mumbai Mayor Kishori Pednekar on Saturday said a decision on the reopening of schools in the city was yet to be taken as it was a question of children’s safety. She said several factors would have to be considered before coming to a conclusion on the matter.

“A final decision will be taken next week by the Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC). The state government has allowed reopening of schools, but it has also left it on the local authorities for the execution of the decision,” the mayor added. Also Read: Maharashtra Schools To Reopen For Classes 8-12 In Urban Areas From Oct 4

Pednekar’s statement comes after the Uddhav Thackeray government said that schools across the state would reopen from October 4.

Many experts have warned of a more severe impact on children if the country is hit by an imminent third wave of the COVID-19 pandemic.

On Friday, School Education Minister Varsha Gaikwad said that physical classes for classes 8 to 12 would resume everywhere in urban areas, while all schools in rural areas would allow students of classes 5th to 12th to attend offline classes.

Until now, schools were only open for individual classes in areas where relatively few cases of coronavirus were reported.

Gaikwad said that no physical session will be started for the children studying in classes one and seven in rural areas.

Also, there was no compulsion on the students to physically attend the classes and parental consent would be required if they wanted to do so.

On Friday, Mumbai registered 446 new Covid-19 cases and six related deaths. Across the state, the figures were 3,286 new infections and 51 fatalities, taking the overall caseload to 65,37,843 and death toll to 1,38,776, respectively.

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