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Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal got into a minor fracas during the Union government’s video conference with Chief Ministers of States with a high COVID-19 burden, after  Kejriwal livestreamed his interjections at the meeting.

Kejriwal, during his interjection at the meeting, while calling for help from the Centre for fulfilling the rising oxygen requirements of hospitals in Delhi, livestreamed his remarks, which Mr. Modi objected to as it was happening, saying it went against the protocol of such closed door meetings.

At this, Kejriwal said that he would not make such a mistake again.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi will on Friday hold several crucial marathon meetings via video conference to discuss present Covid-19 situation in the country and ways to strengthen the virus containment strategy. The meetings were scheduled after the Prime Minister cancelled his election rallies in West Bengal.

Firstly at 9am, an internal meeting will be held where the Prime Minister will review the Covid-19 related situation across the country.

At 10am, Prime Minister Modi will interact with the Chief Ministers of those states, which are severely hit by coronavirus pandemic.

Scientists have reported that a new lineage of SARS-CoV-2, named B.1.618, has been found in India.

According to a report by a national daily, after the B.1.617 “new mutant variant” was found in more than 60 per cent of cases sampled for genome sequencing in Maharashtra, B.1.618, the new variant, has been growing significantly in West Bengal.

A separate report by a media house states that it is characterised by a distinct set of genetic variants including E484K, and is being called a major immune escape variant, that is it can escape immunity even if a person has contracted the virus before and has the ability to produce antibodies against it.

India faces a big challenge with a fresh surge in Covid-19 cases, but efforts are on to ensure that economic activities and livelihood are not affected in the fight against the pandemic, Prime Minister Narendra Modi said on Tuesday, underlining the steps India has taken over the past few weeks to bring down the spiralling infections.

He appealed to the nation to come forward and help those in need, asked migrant workers not to leave cities in view of temporary restrictions in place, and stressed that India’s scientific community had a better understanding of the disease this time around and was prepared to fight the pandemic.

Modi also asked people not to venture out, and exercise caution in these difficult times. “We have to save the country from lockdowns. I will appeal to states to consider lockdown as the last option and instead focus on micro-containment zones,” he said.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi faces growing criticism across the political spectrum for holding large election rallies as the country’s health system reels from a deadly wave of Covid-19 cases, forcing citizens to beg for oxygen and hospital beds on Twitter.

Modi avoided wearing a mask at a campaign rally on Saturday, saying “I’ve never seen such huge crowds” at an event in West Bengal. That night he said “India had defeated Covid last year and India can do it again” following a virtual meeting with health officials who spoke of critical shortages of drugs, vaccines and other supplies in a nation that has seen a string of new daily records in the past two weeks.