Flouting Covid norms, hundreds take part in Ugadi festival in Andhra Pradesh

Throwing caution to the wind amid rising Covid cases, a large crowd gathered in a village in Andhra Pradesh's Kurnool district to celebrate the Ugadi [Telugu New year] festival sans masks and social distancing. This comes at a time when the country is going through the second wave of the coronavirus pandemic and most states are reeling under an acute shortage of healthcare facilities to treat serious Covid patients. The incident took place on Wednesday in Kurnool's Kairuppa village. People hurled cow dung cakes at each other as part of the Ugadi celebrations. As per the tradition, a procession of Lord Veerabhadra Swamy was taken out and then two groups fought with cow dung cakes.