Alarmed over a massive spike in Covid-19 cases and casualties across the State, Punjab Government on Thursday decided to impose weekend lockdown, and daily night curfew from 7 pm to 5 am from Friday onwards in all the 167 cities or towns. At the same time, the Government has also announced a complete ban on all gatherings, except weddings and funerals.
In addition, the Government and private offices will work at 50 per cent capacity till August 31. The concerned officials have also been directed to restrict public visitors in government offices, and encourage use of an online grievance redressal system.
In five worst-affected districts of Amritsar, Ludhiana, Jalandhar, Patiala, and SAS Nagar (Mohali), the government has again decided to impose restrictions on vehicular capacity with buses and other public transport to operate with 50 per cent capacity. The private four-wheelers would not be allowed to carry more than three passengers per vehicle.
The Deputy Commissioners of these five districts — accounting for 80 percent of the active case load in the state — have also been directed to allow only 50 percent of the non-essential shops to open on a daily basis to check crowding.
These emergency measures were ordered by the Chief Minister Capt Amarinder Singh on Thursday during a video conference meeting with top officials to review the Covid-19 situation in the state, while calling for ‘war-like preparedness’ to deal with the massive increase in daily cases and an increase in deaths in the state.
Directing the officials concerned to restrict public visitors in government offices, the Chief Minister asked them to encourage the use of online grievance redressal system, which has been significantly strengthened by the State Government to minimize in-person contact with hassle-free online engagement.
“In the five worst-affected districts of Amritsar, Ludhiana, Jalandhar, Patiala and SAS Nagar (Mohali), restrictions on vehicular capacity have been imposed again, with buses and other public transport to operate with 50 percent capacity and private four-wheelers not allowed to carry more than three passengers per vehicle,” he said while directing the Deputy Commissioners in these five districts to allow only 50 percent of the non-essential shops to open on a daily basis to check crowding.
The Chief Minister also directed the state Director General of Police (DGP) Dinkar Gupta to strictly enforce compliance of rules with regard to the number of persons allowed to attend weddings and funerals, and also to ensure total ban on political gatherings till August 31, when the situation will be reviewed.
He also asked the DGP to crack the whip on all political protests and gatherings, and asked his own party, Punjab Congress, leadership to enforce the ban strictly.
“Enough is enough,” said Capt Amarinder, adding that “we need to be tough without affecting the state’s economic activity”.
Pointing to the 920 COVID deaths reported in the State so far, he said “each death pains me, and the projections for the coming weeks are grim”.
Underlining the need to promote public participation in creating awareness on the measures to check the spread of COVID, the Chief Minister asked the Health Department to promote public participation (lok sanjheydari) by involving all other departments, NGOs, and local politicians to educate the people.
The Chief Minister said that the State was in ‘health emergency’ situation, necessitating harsh measures, which might have to be further intensified in the coming days to curb the COVID spread.
Though the cases were currently concentrated mainly in urban areas, rural areas were also witnessing an increase, he said, adding that if needed, travel restrictions may have to be imposed.