MHA extends nationwide lockdown Till 17th May

The Ministry of Home Affairs on Friday announced an extension of two weeks to the nationwide lockdown which was first declared by Prime Minister Narendra Modi on March 24.

The Lockdown 3.0, however, will not be as restrictive as its previous versions. As per the MHA statement, the strictness of the extended lockdown will depend on the level of Covid-19 outbreak in the respective districts.

The Green Zones are the districts with either zero confirmed cases till date; or, no confirmed case in the last 21 days.

The Red Zones are classified on the basis of the total number of active cases, doubling rate of confirmed cases, the extent of testing and surveillance feedback from the districts.

Those districts, which are neither defined as Red nor Green, are classified as Orange zones.

The MHA had earlier issued a list of current zine-wise listing of the districts across the country. This list will be updated every week.

Also read | Red, Orange, Green Zone district-wise list for coronavirus: Complete classification of areas in India

Since India is trying to exit the lockdown in a graded manner, Lockdown 3.0 – which will be in place from May 4- allows various activities in all zones.

What’s open in Lockdown 3.0:

Red Zones

A large number of other activities are allowed in the Red Zones.

All industrial and construction activities in rural areas, including MNREGA works, food-processing units and brick-kilns are permitted; besides, in rural areas, without distinction to the nature of goods, all shops, except in shopping malls are permitted.
All agriculture activities, e.g., sowing, harvesting, procurement and marketing operations in the agricultural supply chain are permitted.
Animal husbandry activities are fully permitted, including inland and marine fisheries.
All plantation activities are allowed, including their processing and marketing.
All health services (including AYUSH) are to remain functional, including transport of medical personnel and patients through air ambulances.
A large part of the financial sector remains open, which includes banks, non-banking finance companies (NBFCs), insurance and capital market activities, and credit co-operative societies.
Operation of homes for children, senior citizens, destitutes, women and widows etc.; and operation of Anganwadis has also been permitted.
Public utilities, e.g., utilities in power, water, sanitation, waste management, telecommunications and internet will remain open, and courier and postal services will be allowed to operate.
Most of the commercial and private establishments have been allowed in the Red Zones. These include print and electronic media, IT and IT enabled services, data and call centres, cold storage and warehousing services, private security and facility management services, and services provided by self-employed persons, except for barbers etc.
Manufacturing units of essential goods, including drugs, pharmaceuticals, medical devices, their raw material and intermediates; production units, which require continuous process, and their supply chain; Jute industry with staggered shifts and social distancing; and manufacturing of IT hardware and manufacturing units of packaging material will continue to be permitted.

Orange Zones
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In the Orange Zones, in addition to activities permitted in Red Zone, taxis and cab aggregators will be permitted with 1 driver and 1 passenger only. Inter-district movement of individuals and vehicles will be allowed for permitted activities only. Four wheeler vehicles will have maximum two passengers besides the driver and pillion riding will be allowed on two-wheelers.

Green Zones

the Green Zones, all activities are permitted except the limited number of activities that are prohibited throughout the country, irrespective of the zone. However, buses can operate with upto 50 per cent seating capacity and bus depots can operate with upto 50 per cent capacity.

All goods traffic is to be permitted. No State/ UT shall stop the movement of cargo for cross land-border trade under Treaties with neighbouring countries. No separate pass of any sort is needed for such movement, which is essential for maintaining the supply chain of goods and services across the country during the lockdown period.

Additionally, the Centre has also allowed e-commerce websites to deliver non-essential items in orange and green zones.

All other activities, which are not specifically prohibited, will be permitted activities.

However, states/ UTs, based on their assessment of the situation, and with the primary objective of keeping the spread of Covid-19 in check, may allow only select activities from out of the permitted activities, with such restrictions as felt necessary.

What’s closed in Lockdown 3.0

Apart from zone-wise restriction, there is a limited number of activities that will remain prohibited throughout the country, irrespective of zones

These include travel by air, rail, metro and inter-state movement by the road.

Running of school, college, institutions, hospitality services, including hotels and restaurants, place of large gathering, such as cinema halls, malls, gym, sports complex, social, political, cultural and all kind of gathering, religious place/ place of worship for public will continue to remain banned during the lockdown.
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Additional restrictions across the nation:

Public places

Wearing a face cover is compulsory in all public places All persons in charge of public places and transport shall ensure social distancing No gathering of 5 or more persons to be allowed Marriage related gathering shall ensure social distancing with maximum of 50 guests Funeral or last rites to be held with a maximum of 20 people while ensuring social distancing Spitting in public places punishable by fine Consumption of liquor, paan, gutka, tobacco not allowed in public places Shops selling liquor, paan, gutka, etc to ensure the minimum two-metre distance between persons present at shops at all times.

Workplaces

Wearing face cover is compulsory in workplaces All persons in charge of workplaces and transport shall ensure social distancing Social distancing at workplaces to be ensured through adequate gaps between shifts, staggering the lunch breaks of staff, etc Provisions of thermal scanning, hand wash and sanitisers to be made available at all entry and exit points and common areas Frequent sanitisation of workplaces, common areas Persons above 65 years of age, persons with co-morbidities, pregnant women and children below 10 years to stay at home Arogya Setu app to be made mandatory for all employees Large physical meetings to be avoided A list of nearby dedicated Covid-19 hospitals/clinics to be made available. Quarantine areas to be marked so that any employee showing symptoms of coronavirus can be quarantined before being rushed to nearest health facility Arrangements for transport facilities to be ensured with social distancing wherever personal/public transport is not feasible Intensive employee training ion good hygiene

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