In a bizarre incident, the police in Jalgaaon district of Maharashtra have busted a mattress-making factory using discarded masks in place of cotton or other material, to stuff its products. A case has been registered by the police in the case against the owner of the unit and a probe has been initiated. Piles of masks have also been recovered in premises.
As per a NDTV report, officials at the police station at the Maharashtra Industrial Development Corporation (MIDC), Jalgaon, around 400 kilometres northeast of capital Mumbai, were informed of the alleged racket being carried out at the Maharashtra Mattress Centre.
Addiitional Suprintendent of Police, Chandrakant Gawali, "When the officials visited the premises of the factory in Kusumba village of MIDC, they found a mattress being stuffed with used masks."
"A case was registered against the factory owner, Amjad Ahmed Mansoori. The police are now probing the involvement of others in the racket," said Mr Gawali.
The police then set on fire the piles of used masks lying around the premises according to the prescribed norms.
According to Central Pollution Control Board data, Mask production in India has by now surged from the 1.5 crore units a day capacity in March 2020. The pandemic has burdened India's already stressed waste management system. It generated over 18,000 tonnes of Covid-19 related bio-medical waste between June and September 2020 alone, including gloves and face masks.
With around 1.68 lakh new cases of infection, India reported highest single day surge yesterday. Maharashtra alone reported 63,294 of these, with 349 deaths.
Today was the sixth consecutive day India reported over a lakh daily cases
