The city’s strict but successful “zero-Covid” policy had largely kept the virus out for months.

But when the highly transmissible Omicron variant broke through Hong Kong’s defences, authorities were caught flat-footed with a dangerously under-vaccinated population and few plans in place to deal with a mass outbreak.

The extremely contagious Omicron variant was first discovered within Hong Kong’s local community in late December — far later than much of the rest of the world.

Authorities reacted quickly — banning flights, forbidding gatherings of more than two, and launching a mass hamster cull after coronavirus-positive pet store rodents were discovered.

But these measures did little to curb Omicron’s spread.

As of Friday, Hong Kong had recorded more than 20,200 infections in less than two months — outstripping its cumulative two-year total of about 12,000.

City leader Carrie Lam admitted this week the fifth wave had “dealt a heavy blow”, and by Friday announced a postponement to the planned March selection of Hong Kong’s next chief executive.

Britain plans to set out plans next week to remove self-isolation requirements for people infected with Covid, a move that health experts think could be risky. Prime Minister Boris Johnson said in a statement that “Covid will not suddenly disappear, and we need to learn to live with this virus and continue to protect ourselves without restricting our freedoms.”

In England, currently, people are advised to isolate if they have Covid-19 symptoms or test positive. They are legally required to self-isolate for at least five days if instructed to by public health officials

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Efforts by the government resulted in 2.5 times increase in charging stations in Surat, Pune, Ahmedabad, Bengaluru, Hyderabad, Delhi, Kolkata, Mumbai, and Chennai in the last four months, a power ministry statement stated.

According to the statement, additional 678 public EV charging stations were installed between October 2021 and January 2022 in these nine cities. About 940 of India’s 1,640 public EV chargers are located in these cities.

The government has increased its focus initially on the nine mega cities with population of over 4 million.

The Ministry of Power recently issued the revised consolidated Guidelines and Standards for EV charging infrastructure on January 14, 2022.

The Government of India has undertaken multiple initiatives to promote the manufacturing and adoption of electric vehicles in the country.

With the considerable expansion in the public EV charging infrastructure, the electric vehicles have started penetrating the Indian market, it stated.

The government has made 360-degree efforts to enhance public charging infrastructure by involving private and public agencies (BEE, EESL, PGCIL, NTPC, etc.). Many private organisations have also come forward to install EV charging stations to develop convenient charging network grid to gain consumers’ confidence.

After the saturation of EV infrastructure in these mega cities, the government has plans to expand the coverage to other cities in a phased manner.

Oil marketing companies have announced the setting up of 22,000 EV charging stations in prominent cities and on national highways across the country.

Out of 22,000 EV charging stations, 10,000 will be installed by IOCL (Indian Oil), 7,000 will be installed by Bharat Petroleum Corporation Ltd. (BPCL), and the rest of 5,000 will be installed by Hindustan Petroleum Corporation Ltd. (HPCL).

The IOCL has already installed 439 EV charging stations and plans to install another 2,000 EV charging stations over the next year. BPCL has installed 52 charging stations, while HPCL has installed 382 charging stations.

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A day after Prime Minister Narendra Modi apologised to the nation and announced a rollback of the three contentious farm laws underlining that he was not interested in blaming anyone, his colleague Junior Aviation Minister VK Singh on Saturday appeared to stray from the official line, hitting out at farmers’ unions.

“Sometimes we understand things well but then we blindly follow the other person. I asked a farmer leader what is ‘kaala’ or black about these laws that you call ‘kaala kanoon’. I said except the ink what else is black in these laws? He said, ‘I agree but it’s still black’. What is the cure for this? There is no cure. There is a fight for supremacy among farmer organisations. For some reason they are not thinking about the benefit of the small farmer. That is why the PM has taken the laws back,” the MP from Uttar Pradesh’s Ghaziabad said.

The take was a departure from PM Modi’s conciliatory tone and also the talking points handed out to BJP leaders which stress on painting the about-face as one in national interest given alleged attempts by secessionist forces to capitalise on the discord.

Announcing the rollback in a surprise announcement on Friday – the birth anniversary of Guru Nanak, a holy day for thousands of Sikh farmers protesting the law, PM Modi had said it was not the time to blame anyone.

“While apologising to the nation, I want to say with a sincere and pure heart that maybe something was lacking in our tapasya (dedication) that we could not explain the truth, as clear as the light of the diya, to some of our farmer brothers. But today is Prakash Parv, not the time to blame anyone. Today, I want to tell the country that we have decided to repeal the three farm laws,” PM Modi said in an address to the nation.

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