Capital curbs won’t be eased today

New Delhi: Delhi will not immediately ease any restrictions clamped under the national lockdown because coronavirus disease (Covid-19) cases are on the rise in the

New Delhi: Delhi will not immediately ease any restrictions clamped under the national lockdown because coronavirus disease (Covid-19) cases are on the rise in the national capital, chief minister Arvind Kejriwal said on Sunday, even as several other states announced relaxing some norms beginning Monday to jump-start the virus-hit economy.

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Hindustan Times reported on Sunday that the Delhi government did not want to ease restrictions on April 20 on the grounds that the city-state was a “high-risk zone”. All 11 revenue districts in the state are now designated as virus hot spots, with one remaining district (north-east Delhi) joining the list.

At a news conference on Sunday morning, Kejriwal said the government will assess the situation after one week. “There have been instances where people without symptoms were found infected by Covid-19,” the chief minister said. “Delhi has 2% of the country’s population but 12% of the total active cases,” he added.

Kejriwal said many people were facing difficulties because of the lockdown. “But if we give relaxations and if there is a shortage of ICU, ventilators, oxygen in hospitals and people lose their lives, we wouldn’t be able to forgive ourselves. Hence, the decision to not relax lockdown was taken,” he added.

Out of 736 samples collected recently, 186 people were found to be infected by Sars-CoV-2 on Saturday and all of them were asymptomatic, he said, adding that the people did not suspect they had contracted the disease. “This suggests that they would have compromised with isolation norms and potentially spread the virus without even knowing. This is a scary situation.”

At 2,003 cases -- 110 people tested positive on Sunday -- Delhi has the second most Covid-19 infections after Maharashtra, which has 4,200. The city has 80 “containment zones”, where the restrictions are stricter, movement is barred, and home delivery of essentials is facilitated by the administration.

On April 14, Prime Minister Narendra Modi announced that the national lockdown – first imposed on March 25 – will be extended till May 3, but said some of the curbs would be lifted in places outside “containment zones” and in areas where the potential of the pathogen spreading was low, to revive economic activity.

An order released by the Union home ministry a day after PM Modi’s address laid down guidelines for the conditional lifting of some restrictions.

The Delhi government, however, decided to send a proposal to Lieutenant Governor Anil Baijal on Friday evening against the lifting of restrictions after the National Disaster Management Authority (NDMA) informed it of “large outbreaks” in several parts of the city, according to a senior government official who asked not to be named.

Kejriwal attributed the large number of cases in Delhi to heavy airport arrivals from Covid-affected countries and a Tablighi Jamaat congregation in Nizamuddin recently.

The tally of Covid-19 cases first jumped in India after the detection of hundreds of patients who attended gatherings of the Tablighi Jamaat, a Muslim missionary group, in New Delhi’s Nizamuddin last month. Once the cluster – the largest single source so far in the country – was identified and isolated on March 30, daily cases surged. The number of cases in Delhi increased from 72 on March 29 to 2,003 so far – more than 1,000 cases can be linked to the Nizamuddin gathering.

“If there had been no lockdown, the situation here would have been similar to Italy and Spain,” Kejriwal said.

According to an order issued by Delhi chief secretary Vijay Dev, the government will review the situation on April 27.

Food distribution centres in Delhi also came up on the radar after a volunteer tested positive for Covid-19. Kejriwal said people linked to the centres will be among the first batches to be tested with rapid antibody kits.

Of the first batch of 42,000 rapid testing kits that arrived in Delhi on Friday, some were used to evaluate 92 cured patients being discharged from Lok Nayak hospital for plasma therapy trial to treat other Covid-19 patients.

Schools, colleges and coaching centres will continue to remain closed; as will all public transport including buses, auto-rickshaws, taxis, cab aggregator services, e-rickshaws and the Metro. Construction and other business activities, including the operation of non-essential factories will also remain suspended. Goods transport and all essential services that were permitted through the lockdown will continue to operate.

Experts said earlier that the sectors that could have witnessed some relief included self-employed workers such as electricians and plumbers, construction activities in cases where the sites had provisions for safe accommodation of labourers, and activities in industrial zones.

Animesh Das, a labour activist and member of the Delhi government’s minimum wage board, said: “Delhi has around 600,000 constructions workers of which roughly 500,000 are left in the lockdown. Rest managed to leave the city before it was strictly imposed. A significant percentage of them resides at the construction sites. Since relaxations are out of question at this hour, the government should take up an exercise of construction site visits and provide them with direct cash benefits. The workers and their families are currently in poor shape.”

Public health experts said not allowing any relaxation at this time was a good move as ideally all containment zones should have tight restrictions and complete lockdown for at least 28 days.

Jugal Kishore, head of the community medicines department at Delhi’s Safdarjung Hospital, said: “Delhi is vulnerable because of its high population density. Mobility is directly proportional to chances of transmission and that is already visible to some extent after the first phase of the 21-day lockdown. So, stricter restrictions are a necessary step at this juncture. Currently, Delhi is not in a position to relax the lockdown. To contain the transmission of the virus, people have to cooperate.”

Amita Baviskar, a professor of sociology at Ashoka University, said: “Well-to-do families with salaries and savings will sail through. The crisis has hit the lower middle and working classes – small businesses, street vendors, domestic workers, daily wage labourers, and industrial workers. The government may give them two meals a day but they need cash for other necessities such as rent, medicines, school fees, mobile recharge.”