The C ward of the Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC), which covers the Kalbadevi, Bhuleshwar, Mumbadevi and Chirabazar areas of south Mumbai, has emerged to become the first ever municipal ward in the city to record a doubling period over 100 days.
Presently, C ward has a doubling period of 113 days and a growth rate of 0.61 percent. Between October and December last year the average doubling rate of many wards ranged between 150 and 300 days. By the end of February, the doubling period of C ward was around 430 days.
However after the cases in Mumbai started to rise, owing to the second wave of pandemic, the doubling rate of Mumbai along with all the 24 municipal wards also started to decline rapidly. During mid-March, the doubling period of C ward had fallen to 240 days and by the first week of April, this ward had a doubling period of 50 days.
Senior BMC officials of this ward said that the infection rate in C ward has started to decline after the restrictions came into force on April 15.
Chakrapani Alle – assistant municipal commissioner and incharge of the B and C wards have mentioned that owing to the lockdown all the private offices and business establishments are shut, for which crowding in many places have stopped, which has further led to low infection in his ward.
“The local train services are suspended and all the market areas and places of crowding are shut, this has minimised the crowding to a great extent which has resulted in lower infection rate,” Alle told FPJ.
C ward is one of the smallest municipal wards in Mumbai which is also a commercial zone, that records a heavy floating population daily. Between March and April, C ward used to record 45-65 cases daily, after the restrictions came into force, the daily case tally now ranged between 15-25 cases per day.
“The floating population has declined due to the lockdown, our officials are always on the ground surveying all the areas to ensure there is no gathering, if we get any complaints, we take necessary action immediately,” Alle added.
Alongside C ward, two other wards – G North (GN) which covers the Dadar, Mahim and Dharavi areas and T ward, which covers Mulund have also touched the 100 day mark on Wednesday evening.
The M West (MW) which covers the Chembur and Tilak Nagar areas has a doubling period of 98 days and may soon touch the 100 day mark.
Officials in this ward have said that over the past few weeks each of the wards have recorded a decline in the number of daily cases.
The case tally in G North has also fallen by 25 percent with the Dharavi belt recording the lowest case in the past one month on Tuesday.
“We were the first ward to take strict action against anybody who were seen flouting protocols, our rapid action team have been on the ground since January and this have instilled fear amongst many people living over here,” said an official of MW ward.
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