Inviting third wave? Despite rising cases of Omicron, massive crowd turns up at Kolkata's Park Street during Chrismas

At a time when the Omicron cases in the country are rapidly rising and every state is taking precautions to avoid the third possible wave, the people of West Bengal were seen celebrating Christmas without maintaining social distance and blatantly breaching the COVID norms.

 

As the Mamata Banerjee-led government relaxed the night curfew restrictions during the Christmas and New Year celebrations, thousands of people thronged Park Street,and were engulfed in the essence of Christmas, without worrying about the COVID-19 protocols.

 

Despite a massive police force who were deployed there to manage the uncontrollable crowd, the crowds were seen breaching all the COVID norms. People were also seen fighting amongst themselves to get a seat in Park Street restaurants for their Christmas dinner.

 

 

 

The photographs and videos of the overcrowded area have been making rounds on the social media platform, with the majority of the people criticizing such a crowd amidst the fears of the spread of the new variant Omicron of Covid-19. In some viral pictures spread on social media, people can be seen without masks, some were seen half masked with their noses uncovered.

 

 

Due to the overcrowding, traffic was suspended for a few hours on Saturday evening. Apart from Park Street, thousands of people also flocked to different tourist destinations in the city and elsewhere on the occasion of Christmas. Social distancing was thrown into disarray as massive crowds gathered in St Paul’s Cathedral, Alipore zoo, Eco park, Victoria Memorial, and Nicco Park.

 

 

 

BJP MLA from Asansol South Agnimitra Paul targeted West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee, accusing the CM of endangering the lives of people.

 

It should be noted that the Central government has sent a delegation to ten states, including West Bengal, to study the active Omicron cases. In a memorandum issued by the union government, the ten states, including WB, Kerala, Maharashtra, Karnataka, etc., have lower vaccination rates compared to the national average. Meanwhile, on Saturday, 552 fresh cases of COVID-19 were reported from West Bengal. Till Sunday morning, West Bengal has reported six cases of the Omicron variant.

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