Swimming Pools to reopen in Tamil Nadu from this week

The swimming pools in the southern state of Tamil Nadu will reopen for trainings in the first week of December, for the first time since the coronavirus imposed lockdown in March. Though the date for reopening is yet to be finalised, this was listed in the guidelines released by the state government on Monday.

The decision from the Tamil Nadu government comes almost two months after the Ministry of Home Affairs (MHA) allowed pools across the country to reopen. The guidelines by the Tamil Nadu government is more or less similar to the one released by the MHA in October with a maximum of 20 swimmers in a 50m pool with 10 lanes and 16 swimmers in a 25m or 50m pool with 8 lanes.

The pools in the state will only be accessible to competitive swimmers above the age of 12 years with the chlorine to be strictly maintained at 2.0 PPM and Ph levels between 7 to 7.4.

The New Indian Express quoted the secretary of Tamil Nadu State Aquatic Association (TNSAA), T. Chandrasekaran saying, "Sanitisation of pools owned by Sports Development Authority of Tamil Nadu has begun. Even many private pools have started work to get ready in a week. We will follow MHA guidelines. We are just awaiting the exact date for reopening since the government order does not mention it.”

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