Schools to reopen from August 17 in Maharashtra

On Friday night, Maharashtra State Education Minister Varsha Gaikwad announced that schools in both urban and rural areas will reopen from August 17.

"Offline classes will commence in rural areas for students from Classes 5 to 8, while those in cities will be for students from Classes 8 to 12 following COVID-19 protocols" said Varsha Gaikwad.

A detail order regarding this issue is expected to be released soon.

The state reported 5,539 new cases of COVID-19 yesterday with 187 fatalities which took the total caseload to 63.41 lakh and the death toll to 1,33,717.

Her announcement comes on a day when two other states, Karnataka and Tamil Nadu, also laid out their plans to resume offline classes. In Karnataka, classes for students 9-12 will begin from August 23, while in Tamil Nadu, the classes will begin from September 1.

Several states including Punjab, Gujarat and Madhya Pradesh have already reopened schools for offline classes.