Maharashtra govt's priority is to tackle COVID-19 crisis: Aaditya Thackeray

Ignoring the opposition's criticism of the Maharashtra government's handling of the COVID-19 crisis, state minister Aaditya Thackeray has said the priority of the government is to tackle the pandemic situation and other things are secondary. The state environment and tourism minister was talking to reporters in Thane on Saturday evening while he was here to take stock of the COVID-19 situation and measures undertaken by civic bodies in the district to contain the disease.

Asked about the opposition's criticism that the government was unable to properly tackle the COVID-19 crisis, Thackeray said, "Let them do their work, we will keep on doing our work. Our priority at present is to deal with the COVID-19 situation and break the virus chain, other things are secondary."

The Shiv Sena MLA also launched an app developed by the Thane Municipal Corporation (TMC) for online hospital bed allocation and ambulance booking.


Addressing a COVID-19 review meeting at the TMC headquarters here, Thackeray stressed on the need for increased contact-tracing and maintenance of good facilities at the quarantine centres.

He asked the civic officials to periodically inspect the quarantine centres and check various facilities, including the food supplied there.

He also suggested for increasing the testing capacity.

The review meeting was attended by Thane Guardian Minister Eknath Shinde, Mayor Naresh Mhaske and other senior leaders from the district.

The TMC already has a dashboard providing information about the availability of beds in Thane hospitals and the COVID-19 situation in the city.

Till Saturday, Maharashtra reported 2,00,064 COVID-19 cases and 8,671 deaths due to the disease.

The COVID-19 tally in Thane district reached 40,542 on Saturday and the death toll rose to 1,221.