Bhubaneswar: The Odisha government announced Friday that both Bhubaneswar and Bhadrak cities will be completely shut down for 48 hours beginning Friday itself at 8.00pm to prevent the spread of the deadly coronavirus. “All the coronavirus cases detected in Odisha have either been from Bhubaneswar or from Bhadrak. Hence the decision has been taken to completely shut down these two cities for 48 hours,” Odisha Chief Secretary Asit Tripathy told reporters here.
In a development later in the day, a sixth COVID-19 positive case was reported. The man had a travel history to Delhi. In view of this development, the government has also decided to impose the 48-hour shutdown in Cuttack beginning 8.00pm Friday.
The chief secretary also said that such a step is being taken to break the chain of the disease. “The fifth COVID-19 case was detected in Bhubaneswar a couple of days back while the fourth patient is from Bhadrak. The complete shutdown will help our surveillance team in contact tracing the persons who have come in contact with these two patients,” informed Asit Tripathy.
Except for some medicine shops in these two cities, all other establishments will remain closed for the 48 hours. The district administration will decide which medicine shops will remain open.
Odisha Director General of Police (DGP) Abhaya who was also present at the press conference said that all vehicle passess issued by the police in these two towns will remain suspended for the 48 hours. He however, assured people not to resort to panic buying as the shutdown is only for 48 hours. Abhaya also informed that there will be no restriction in movement of good vehicles in these two cities during the complete shutdown.
Later in the day, briefing the press on the steps taken by state government for prevention of COVID-19, Subroto Bagchi, chief spokesperson of state government on COVID-19 said that the government has taken the step to contain the spread of coronavirus and aggressively trace contacts of 5th and 6th COVID-19 positive patients.
All shops including those dealing in grocery, vegetable, fruit, milk etc, all business centres and other establishments will remain closed. Only Health, Police and some limited emergency services will be available in the shutdown period. The medicine stores identified by municipal authority and drug controller will remain open.
Special passes will be issued by the police authorities to facilitate people involved in emergency services exempted under the shutdown. Persons violating the shutdown regulations will be taken into 14 days compulsory government quarantine and will be prosecuted under Disaster Management Act-2005 and IPC, a notification issued by the state government said.
PNN
