India rings in New Year 2022 with low key celebrations

New Delhi, Jan 01: People across India bid adieu to 2021 and welcomed New Year 2022 with muted celebrations due to a surge of coronavirus infections, this time driven by the highly contagious Omicron variant.

No celebratory events, congregations and gatherings at public places were permitted and section 144 have been imposed in Bengaluru, Mumbai, and other cities.

Despite curbs, people still found a way to make the best of the situation and celebrated the New Year by staying indoors with close family members.

Mumbai Police on Friday issued an order prohibiting people from visiting beaches, open grounds, sea faces, promenades, gardens, parks or similar public places between 5 pm and 5 am daily till January 15 in view of the rising Omicron cases.

Bengaluru city police imposedfresh restrictions in view of the new year celebrations on Friday. As per the revised order, prohibitory orders will be in place from 6 pm on Friday till 5 am on Saturday.

In Delhi, shoppers and new year revellers gathered at popular hotspot like Connaught Place and Sarojini Nagar even as there was intensive patrolling and enforcement to ensure adherence to Covid-appropriate behaviour, amid a rise in infections in the national capital.

The optimism of a year that started with the COVID-19 vaccine rollout, seen as the beginning of the end of the pandemic, has petered out as 2021 winds to a close. The SARS-CoV-2 virus is still around, and more infectious than earlier.

As the Omicron strain spreads across the globe and questions on vaccine inequity dominate discussions, scientists are still scrambling to learn more about emerging variants of the deadly virus that has claimed millions of lives and crippled economies.

New Zealand, Australia celebrate New Year

New Zealand was one of the first places to celebrate the new year with a low-key lights display projected onto Auckland landmarks, including the Sky Tower and Harbour Bridge. That replaced the traditional fireworks show. While there hasn't yet been any community spread of Omicron in New Zealand, authorities still wanted to discourage crowds gathering.

Neighbouring Australia, however, was going ahead with its celebrations despite an explosion in virus cases. Some fireworks were let off early in the evening to give younger children a preview of the centrepiece of festivities, the renowned fireworks display from the Sydney Harbour Bridge and Sydney Opera House.

Hours before the celebrations began, Australian health authorities reported a record 32,000 new virus cases, many of them in Sydney.