Bengaluru: Thousands of people, most of them unmasked, took part in a crowded religious gathering in Karnataka's Chikkamagaluru district despite a ban on mass gatherings to check the Covid spike in the state.
The chariot festival at Shri Shakuna Ranganatha Swamy Temple, visuals of which show hundreds of people with no sign of social distancing at all, was held even after the local administration ordered that the procession not be taken out.
The COVID-19 experts in Karnataka expect that the state may witness coronavirus infections touching the peak on January 25 before coming down gradually, Karnataka Revenue Minister R Ashoka said on Monday.
"The experts are of the opinion that the COVID cases may reach the peak on January 25, after which it will gradually decrease. They were also of the view that the state should reduce testing from over two lakh a day to about 1.5 lakh as it does not help much," Ashoka told reporters after the meeting on COVID-19 which was chaired by Chief Minister Basavaraj Bommai.
Karnataka on Monday reported 27,156 fresh COVID-19 infections and 14 deaths taking the total caseload and fatalities in the state to 32,47,243 and 38,445 respectively, the health department said.
The state had reported 34,047 cases and 13 deaths in the state on Sunday. With the decline in cases compared to Sunday, the test positivity rate too dropped from 19.29 per cent to 12.45 per cent. The case fatality rate was 0.05 per cent.
In its daily bulletin, the department said 7,827 people were discharged, taking the total number of recoveries to 29,91,472. The active cases stood at 2,17,297.
Bengaluru Urban district led the spike in cases in Karnataka with 15,947 infections and five deaths. Other districts too recorded fresh cases, including 1,770 in Mysuru, 1,147 in Tumakuru, 1,050 in Hassan and 784 in Dharwad.
There were three deaths in Dakshina Kannada and one each in Chikkaballapura, Dharwad, Kalaburagi, Ramanagara and Tumakuru. There were zero fatalities in 23 districts.
A total of 2,17,998 samples were tested in the state, including 1,81,136 RT-PCR tests on Monday, taking the cumulative number of specimens examined so far to 5.92 crore. There were 2,16,816 inoculations done taking the total vaccinations so far to 9.17 crore, the department said. PTI GMS GMS HDA
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