Now Saudi women may drive thousands of NRI drivers out of the kingdom

Bengaluru, Apr 28: With fresh guidelines on the COVID-19 lockdown expected soon, Karnataka Chief Minister B S Yediyurappa on Monday chaired a meeting with key ministers, officials and Deputy Commissioners of districts and discussed about re-starting economic activities in the state, as he took stock about of the pandemic.

"At the video conference with DCs, CM took stock of COVID-19 situation and measures taken to control its spread. Discussions also happened regarding starting of certain economic activities in parts of the state," official sources said. The state government would take any decision in this regard after the Centre issues fresh guidelines or directives, they said, without elaborating.

The meeting came hours after Prime Minister Narendra Modi held a video conferencing with Chief Ministers to discuss the situation arising due to COVID-19 in the country, which is under lockdown since March 25 to contain the pandemic. Only nine chief ministers spoke in the virtual meeting with the Prime Minister and Yediyurappa did not get an opportunity.

A senior Minister, who attended the meeting told PTI, necessary directions regarding the lockdown after May 3, they were likely to come in a couple of days.

"Most of the Chief Ministers wanted the lockdown to continue to contain the spread.... nothing concrete emerged, but we expect the necessary directions will follow in couple of days. This is what we expect after seeing what has happened as a followup to three to four such video conferences in the past," he said.

The Minister said the larger opinion was that the current measures should continue and interstate or inter-district movement should not be allowed. Regarding movement within the districts that are green zone, some decision may be taken soon, he said, adding the Prime Minister also asked states to concentrate on reforms, aimed at attracting investments in the days to come.

Thiruvananthapuram, Jun 9: Malls, restaurants and places of worship opened in Kerala on Tuesday morning after over two-and half months of Coronavirus induced lockdown. There were very few visitors in the malls and restaurants in the early hours and people preferred takeaways in eateries.

Various temples, including the famous Lord Krishna temple at Guruvayoor, a few churches and mosques opened in the state for the devotees. The Guruvayur shrine opened at 9.30 am and around 150 people, who had booked through virtual queue system, offered prayers.

Devotees wearing masks were seen standing adhering to the social distance norm. A faithful at the guruvayur temple said he had booked for darshan on Sunday and was happy to be offering worship after a long gap. "This is a realisation of a dream", he said.

In the state capital while the famed Lord Padmanabha swamy, Pazhavanangadi Ganapathy and Attukal Bhagavathy temples remained shut, the SreekanteshwaraShiva shrine and Lord Hanuman temple near the state assembly were among those which opened for darshan. The names, age and other details of the worshippers are also being collected by the temple authorities before letting people in. Another devotee said it was very painful not to go to the temple and expressed happiness over reopening of the shrines.

The virtual queue booking for devotees to offer worship at the hill shrine of Lord Ayyappa temple at Sabarimala would commence from Wednesday. Devotees from other states have to produce a Covid-19 negative certificate while booking,sources in the Travancore Devaswom Board (TDB), administers the temple, said.

The Ayyappa shrine would open from June 14 to 28 for the five day monthly pooja and temple festival and only 10 people would be allowed inside the shrine at a time, sources said.

Most of the over 1,200 temples under the TDB, have opened while those under the Nair Service Society (NSS), an organisation of the Nair community and few other shrines were shut. The state government, which had come under attack from the BJP and Hindu Aikya vedi for opening the temples in a "hasty manner" has maintained that the decision was taken in line with the Centre's Unlock-1 guidelines and said those opposing the move had earlier wanted devotees to be allowed into the shrines.

As per the centre's Standard Operating Procedures, social distancing should be followed in all the places of worship and devotees should wear face mask are among other precautions in view of the COVID-19 pandemic.

Those above 65 and children below 10 years would not be allowed in places of worship, distribution of food, refreshments and offertory blessings (prasadams), sandalwood paste or ashes should be avoided. Thermal scanners to check body temperatures, sanitiisers, arrangements for washing hands, were all provided in the temples and other places of worship which opened this morning, In churches in the state capital, Kochi and Kozhikode, allowedthe faithful inside after disinfecting the place.

The orthodox church synod is being held on Tuesday which will take a decision on whether or not to open their places of worship. Few mosques were also open in some places.

Bengaluru, May 20: Ride-sharing company Ola Cabs said on Wednesday it will lay off 1,400 of its employees due to business uncertainty caused by the coronavirus pandemic while the revenue has come down by 95 per cent in the past two months.

"The COVID crisis continues to unfold all around us causing unprecedented economic and social destruction. It has also become evident that the coronavirus will not be eliminated any time soon," wrote co-founder and CEO Bhavish Aggarwal to all Ola employees.

"In these circumstances, today I write to all of you with the toughest decision I have ever taken -- the need to downsize our organisation and let go of 1,400 of our valued employees," he said.

Aggarwal said the fallout of virus has been very tough for the cab aggregating industry in particular. "The company's revenue has come down by 95 per cent over the past two months," he said.

Initially, he said, the company hoped it would be a short-lived crisis and that its impact would be temporary. "But unfortunately, it is not been a short crisis. And the prognosis ahead for our business is very unclear and uncertain. It is going to take a long time for people to go out and about like before."
With more companies preferring to have a large number of employees work from home, air travel limited to essential trips and vacations being put off for better times, the impact of this crisis is definitely going to be long-drawn, said Aggarwal.

"The world is not going to revert to the pre-COVID era anytime soon. Social distancing, anxiety and an abundance of caution will be the operating principles for everyone," he told employees.

Aggarwal said the crisis necessitates the need to conserve cash aggressively so that Ola is able to invest in opportunities in the future, adding the downsizing exercise has been a very tough and sad decision for the management team to make.

"While we restructure our organisation to the new realities of our business, we are also going to recommit ourselves to strengthening our operational excellence and leverage a lot more technology to improve efficiencies and reduce cost across all parts of our business," he said.