On May 22, Tamil Nadu CM M.K. Stalin announced the extension of lockdown. A day before the announcement, Karnataka CM B.S. Yediyurappa also announced the extension of the statewide lockdown. While India has been registering lesser and lesser new COVID-19 cases every day, some states are still fighting hard to cut the chain of transmission and bring down the positivity level.
Tamil Nadu Extends Lockdown
As the state is not seeing positivity rate decrease or decrease in the number of fresh cases, the Tamil Nadu announced that the state will extend its lockdown till May 31. On May 21, the state registered 36,184 new cases with the overall tally at 17,70,988 total cases.
Tamil Nadu Lockdown: What’s Allowed & What’s not
1. All essential services such as pharmacies (including traditional and veterinary) will remain open.
2. Dairies/ newspaper supplies and water supply will remain operational.
3. All the essential departments at the state’s District Headquarters will remain open.
4. E-Commerce companies can remain operational between 8 AM – 6 PM.
5. Takeaways from restaurants/hotels allowed between 6 AM – 10 AM, 12 PM –3 PM & 6 PM – 9 PM. Zomato & Swiggy can continue delivering food at the above-mentioned time.
6. Petrol pumps, ATM to remain open.
7. Trucks and vehicles carrying produce, farm products & essential services are allowed.
8. Inter district travel for reasons such as medical and death are allowed with e-registration
9. Intra district travel for the above-mentioned purposes are allowed without e-registration.
10. All shops can remain open till 9 PM on Saturday and again between 6 AM – 9 PM on Sunday.
Karnataka Extends Lockdown
On May 21, the Karnataka government also announced extension of the statewide lockdown. The move comes at a time when the state is also reporting more than 30 thousand fresh cases every day. The Karnataka CM B.S Yediyurappa on Friday said that the current statewide lockdown will continue till June 7, 6 AM. Yediyurappa also said that the state police have been directed to take strict action against those who are not following the lockdown rules.
Earlier, the Karnataka state govt had announced a 14-day ‘close-down’ from April 27. However, as the cases continued growing, the state was forced to enforce a complete lockdown from May 10 to May 24.
On Friday, May 21, Karnataka reported 32,218 new COVD-19 cases which took the state’s total tally to 23,67,742. The biggest contributor in the state is Bengaluru, as it has a total of 2,89,131 confirmed cases as of yet.
Karnataka lockdown: What’s allowed and What’s not allowed
1. Theatres, malls, stadiums, swimming pools, gymnasiums, entertainment parks, etc are closed.
2. All social, entertainment, religious or political gatherings are banned.
3. All places of worship to continue remaining closed.
4. Bus services and private passenger vehicles completely closed.
5. Hotels, restaurants, liquor shops continue operating on takeaway & delivery strictly.
6. Movement of passenger vehicles allowed only for emergency purposes (interstate and intra state).
7. Government offices such as defence, armed forces, PSUs, health department offices, municipal & district administration offices to remain open.
8. Banks to continue remain open.
9. Movement of goods & cargo such as agricultural and essential allowed.
10. Grocery shops to remain open from 6 AM to 10 PM.
11. Fruits, vegetables, dairies, milk booths, meat & fish shops will remain open from 6 AM to 10 PM.
12. Marriages are allowed with maximum 50 people in attendance. Funerals are allowed with maximum 5 persons in attendance.
Also Read: Black Fungus Declared Epidemic in 4 States; Centre issues guidelines on early detection & prevention
