The Maharashtra government on Monday announced that the hotels and other entities providing accommodation services in the state including Mumbai Metropolitan Region (MMR) are allowed to operate at 33 per cent capacity from July 8.
This comes after Maharashtra Chief Minister Uddhav Thackeray on Sunday held a meeting with the officials of hotels association in the state. Thackeray had said that the hotels and lodges are important to the tourism business but should be allowed with extreme care.
In the order issued by newly appointed Chief Secretary Sanjay Kumar, hotels along with lodges and guest houses among others have been allowed to operate from July 8 onwards outside containment zones while adhering to social distancing and other guidelines issued by the government to contain the spread of the coronavirus.
Talking about how the industry should strategies to recover the loss, Santosh Singh, Hotel Manager - Radisson Mumbai Goregaon, said, "As for strategy ahead, the remaining of 2020 hotels will merely be on the survival mode. It’s only in the first quarter next, that is if the vaccine comes, we can see some recovery and things coming back to normal. Hotels will have to modify their operations quite a bit, more dependence on contactless solutions such as digital menus or digital transactions modes will be the new normal. In terms of business, restaurants and banquets will take a hit due to reduced capacity and physical distancing. Soon, hotels will have to adopt advanced disinfection process."
Under the fifth phase of ‘Mission Begin Again’, the Maharashtra government has ease restrictions for hotels to start their business amid the coronavirus outbreak on a condition that they will operate at 33 per cent capacity. The amendment in the order by the state executive committee stated that the 67 per cent of the balanced capacity of these entities can be used as a quarantine facility by the district administration.
It further read that the hotels and other entities which are being used for quarantine facilities will continue to be used by the state administration unless decided otherwise. Downloading of 'Aarogya Setu' app is mandatory to get a stay at any hotel.
Meanwhile, no other ease in restrictions has been provided as of now. The current lockdown (lockdown 6.0) in Maharashtra will end on July 31 midnight. However, under unlock 2.0 which is about opening economic activities, the state government has allowed several businesses to open up.
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