India Lockdown 3.0 Till May 17: More Relaxations Zone-Wise!
The biggest lockdown of the world has just got its
third extension with the Government of India announcing this with a host of
relaxation of curbs across the zones. The first lockdown of 21 days was
extended on 14th April, 2020 to 3rd May, 2020 and now
Lockdown 2.0 has been extended by another 2 weeks till 17th May,
2020. This decision was on expected lines as the new COVID cases and new deaths
were rising in the last few days, and the only speculation was about how much
easing of curbs will be allowed. At present, India has 130 red zones, 284
orange zones and 319 green zones. Easing of the curbs as per the zones is of
paramount importance to ensure the plummeting economy does not suffer
irreparable damage.
First, the basic nation-wide list of activities not
allowed irrespective of zones: schools, colleges and educational institutions
to remain shut; no air, rail and metro transport services; no inter-state
movement except for trucks carrying goods; no cabs, auto-rickshaws and cycle rickshaws:
hotels, restaurants, eateries, resorts to remain shut; cinema halls, malls,
gyms and other places of mass gathering to remain shut; no public religious worship,
social and entertainment gatherings; market complexes, barber shops and salons
to remain shut; and no non-essential movement of persons from 7 pm to 7 am every
day.
Second, relaxations in the red zones: agricultural
work; rural and urban construction work with the condition that workers remain
on the sites; private companies can work with 33% attendance and for government
offices only senior officers can attend with minimum supporting staff; OPD facilities
except for containment zones; e-commerce allowed only for essentials while sale
of non-essentials being allowed; neighborhood standalone shops including the
liquor and paan shops can open with
the condition that not more than 5 persons can be present at a time, not those
shops that are part of malls or market complexes.
Third, naturally, all those relaxations will also be
valid for orange and green zones. Additionally for orange zones cabs with not
more than two passengers and bikes without a pillion-rider will be allowed to ply.
For green zones public buses with 50% of capacity passengers will be allowed
and inter-district movement will also be allowed under monitoring.
More clarity and more detailed guidelines are
expected anytime tonight or tomorrow. The Indian states had been insisting with
the central government for the opening of liquor and other non-essential shops
for the primary reason of being able to earn some much-needed revenues. The opening
of neighborhood shops will also help the petty shopkeepers survive, after the
deadly blows delivered by the two earlier lockdowns. The states have also been demanding funds from
the central government to implement COVID work, and with stimulus package not
being announced yet the crisis looks far from over.
Meanwhile Indian Railways in close coordination with
various state governments has decided to transport the stranded migrant workers
to their home states; the first two non-stop trains having started already. A few
states had earlier started the work with buses not only to shift migrant
workers, but also stranded students and other persons stranded outside their
own states for essential work. The biggest lockdown now stretching to at least
54 days the need to achieve a victory against the killer virus becomes all the
more desperate.
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