Gautam Budh Nagar allows industries to function during curfew

Gautam Budh Nagar on Wednesday registered four Covid-19 related deaths in the last 24 hours, taking the death toll to 118, according to the Uttar Pradesh health department bulletin on Wednesday

Gautam Budh Nagar on Wednesday registered four Covid-19 related deaths in the last 24 hours, taking the death toll to 118, according to the Uttar Pradesh health department bulletin on Wednesday. The district also recorded 536 cases taking the tally of positive cases to 32,133 and 4009 active cases.

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Government and private hospitals in the district faced shortage of oxygen. While the district required 60 metric tonnes (MT) of oxygen a day, the supply was less than 10 MT.

Suhas LY, district magistrate, GB Nagar, said that due to rise in the number of Covid patients, the oxygen demand had increased sharply. “There is acute shortage of oxygen in the hospitals but the supply has not stopped. We are trying to manage things with limited resources,” he said.

Meanwhile, the GB Nagar district administration has allowed all the industrial units to function during the weekend curfew in the district. “The employees should produce their IDs when asked by the officials,” he said.

The same will be implemented in Ghaziabad as well. The move comes after the Awnish Kumar Awasthi, addl chief secretary to UP government, issued a letter to the district administration and police on Wednesday. On April 16, the government had issued directions for shutdown from 8 pm on Saturday to 7am on Monday. On Tuesday, the government again issued the directions to extend the weekend curfew from Friday 8 pm till Monday 7am.

Sudhir Shrivastava, Noida Entrepreneurship Association (NEA) vice president and spokesperson, welcomed the move. “The industries have already been closed for months and suffered losses. Now they function with limited workforce,” he said.

NEA has around 3000 members who deal in various fields, like mobile phone accessories, ITs, garments, packaging, cable, etc.

Shrivastava also said that the UP and Delhi government should make a coordination for enforcement. “We source some of our raw materials from Delhi, where the government has enforced a weeklong lockdown. We can’t buy any products from there now. If the enforcement continues, Noida industry will suffer. There should be a similar enforcement order for industries in both Noida and Delhi,” he said.