GENRE: In Focus

With no income and no food for the past three months, the sex workers of Kamathipura are desperate to go back to work, even if it gets them just a cup of tea and bread!

After reporting eight deaths of staff members from COVID, BEST management stopped giving out numbers. A union leader puts the death toll at 74 and complains of unjust treatment.

A BMC press note assures citizens of corrective action taken in 169 flood-prone spots and ongoing work at 43 spots, but what Mumbai really needs is sustained, hydrology-based water bodies management.

Little thought is being given to how students of corporation schools will be able to access this, given that for most of them access to quality internet connection and the devices required is severely limited.

Over 2000 cops in Mumbai have tested positive and 20 have succumbed to the disease. This could have been minimised had the 50000 strong force been better trained and equipped.

Mumbai has an estimated 3 million migrant workers. Even if the railways ferry about 2400 people in two trains per day, it will take a couple of months to transport them back home.

Over 90 health care workers, including nurses and doctors, have tested positive in Mumbai with an additional 150-200 nurses under quarantine. The United Nurses Association has moved the SC seeking mandatory protection kit for all health care workers in isolation wards.

Mumbai’s health officials are working on a war footing to ensure containment of the virus by creating containment zones and sanitising entire localities besides extensive screening. But they face a humongous task.

Maharashtra Housing and Area Development Authority (MHADA), the state’s nodal agency for public housing provision, is no longer able to build and sell houses at affordable rates. Many blame the tweaks in government policies that conveniently favour the corporate builders’ lobby.

Missing the safety of studios, graffiti involves scaling tall buildings, working long nights, and often secretly, with the risk of getting caught by cops. Nevertheless, using graffiti as a tool of protest, female artists in our cities are breaking stereotypes.

In line with a government decision aimed at promoting tourism, Mumbai — the city that never sleeps — is running a pilot project that allows select malls and eateries to stay open all day and night. A week after the experiment started, we asked citizens and businesses about their experience.

In March 2018, Maharashtra imposed a blanket ban on the use of plastic in the state, particularly in Mumbai. Almost two years later, the city still finds itself grappling with plastic waste, largely due to patchy implementation by BMC and inadequate attention to processing of discarded plastic.