Haryana government imposes night curfew
Premium- The curfew with immediate effect would be applicable across the state, including Gurugram neighbouring the national capital
Soaring covid-19 cases breached 1.60 lakhs mark on Monday, highest ever since the pandemic hit India, forcing several states to impose night curfews, local restrictions and lockdowns.
Following Delhi, Rajasthan, Maharashtra, Madhya Pradesh, Haryana government on Monday also imposed a night curfew. The curfew with immediate effect would be applicable across the state, including Gurugram neighbouring the national capital. The movement of all non-essential personnel and vehicles will be banned in the state between 9 PM and 5 AM till further orders. No person shall leave their home or shall move on foot or by vehicle or travel or stand or roam around on any road or public place between 9 PM and 5 AM, the government order reads.
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Delhi having over 6175 containment zones has already imposed night restrictions. The national capital recorded over 11, 491 cases on Monday. In Chhattisgarh, orders have been issued to impose complete lockdown in 17 districts by the respective administrations. Now it will be mandatory for railway passengers to have a negative report of the corona test conducted within 72 hours before reaching Chhattisgarh.
As far as Rajasthan is concerned, while Jaipur, Kota and Jodhpur reported significant spike in cases, Udaipur has emerged as the biggest hotspot, reporting 864 new infections in 24 hours. In the past five days, 72 people have died of Covid-19. Chief minister Ashok Gehlot concerned over the rise has said that “strict" measures will be taken one of these would be further restricting the number of guests in weddings.
On similar lines, Madhya Pradesh Chief Minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan said that in order to effectively prevent coronavirus spread in the state, a spontaneous “corona curfew" will be implemented in cities.
Health economists have said that restrictions may again impact country’s economy that was slowly recovering from a setback. “India's GDP which witnessed positive recovery in the third quarter of last financial year, may further push to negative territory if the lockdown is implemented. Hotel, transport, communication and service sector, which was hit badly in the first two quarters, got some momentum in the third quarter, will be worse hit in the second phase of lockdown. Finally, consumer confidence which is already low affecting the spending behaviour of majority, will further deteriorate influencing the sluggish demand in the second wave," said Additional Professor of health economics at Indian Institute of Public Health Bhubaneswar.
The top 10 districts with the highest number of active Covid-19 cases remain Pune, Mumbai, Nagpur, Thane, Nashik, Aurangabad, Nanded, Delhi and Ahmednagar. Concerned over the rising cases in Maharashtra, Chhattisgarh and Punjab, the union health secretary Rajesh Bhushan on Saturday a wrote a letter to each “high disease burden" state expressing concern about the exponential rise in cases and high deaths.
The union health ministry pointed out that apart from Mumbai, Pune other hotspots rising are Buldhana, Satara, Aurgangabad, Nanded Palghar, Amravwati, Jalna and Latur in Maharashtra. Patiala and Ludhiana in Punjab are having high cases and low contact tracing the health ministry said. The central teams highlighted that hospital bed occupancy rates were found to be high in Balod, Raipur, Durg and Mahasamund Districts in Chattisgarh as these are also emerging as hotspots.
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2 min read . 09:37 PM ISTAs Maharashtra is bearing the maximum brunt of the pandemic, State revenue minister of Maharashtra Balasaheb Thorat said that strict curbs will be imposed in the state. Conditions is no different in Gujarat as the country's largest 1200-bed Civil Covid Hospital in Ahmedabad is now completely filled with coronavirus patients, the state government said. Gujarat Government has closed offline classes till 30th April in all the government and private colleges in the state.
Even as India started vaccinating its population against covid-19, the performance of the nationwide inoculation program is being marred by the shortage of vaccines. With Covid-19 cases increasing at an alarming rate in Kerala, initiated steps to address the vaccine shortage which is threatening to upset the government’s ‘Crush the Curve’ campaign aimed at speeding up the vaccination drive. At present the state has a stock of only about eight lakh doses of the vaccine. The Centre has promised that more than 15 lakh doses of the vaccine will be provided by Thursday, the state government said.
Even as the four-day-long mass vaccination drive 'Tika Utsav' took off in the country on Sunday, followed by the call given by Prime Minister Narendra Modi, several districts in Andhra Pradesh including Visakhapatnam, Srikakulam and East Godavari could not follow suit as they grapple with shortage of vaccine doses.
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