COVID lockdown in Pune: Restaurants, malls, religious places shut; night curfew enforced

Following massive spike in COVID-19 cases in Maharashtra, the authorities in Pune has revised the night curfew timings to 6 pm-6 am from the earlier 8 pm-7 am and have also decided to shut restaurants, bars, malls and religious places for seven days.

The decision was taking following a Covid-19 review meeting chaired by Maharashtra Deputy Chief Minister Ajit Pawar, reported The Indian Express.

Restaurants, the report said, shall be allowed to provide food parcel and delivery services until 10 pm..

The order will be implemented from Saturday (April 3) and will be reviewed next Friday. A state-wide night-curfew is in force from 8 pm to 7 am along with other stringent measures. 

“We have collectively decided to take some measures keeping in mind the goal of causing minimal hassle to citizens, but those that will help us slow down the spread of the virus. A golden mean was settled upon,” Rao said, according to the report.

Rao added that no social, cultural or political event will be allowed to take place for the next seven days, except marriages and last rites. “For last rites, a maximum of 20 persons will be allowed and for marriages the limit will be 50,” Rao said.

He added that the administration had started an aggressive vaccination campaign, and it will continue to increase the daily vaccinations until, in a few days, it clocks 1 lakh daily vaccinations.

“Vaccination is the most important aspect of Covid management at present. The vaccination speed of Pune is highest in the state and the country. Yesterday (Thursday), we vaccinated over 57,000 individuals. We will speed up the vaccination drive in future as well. In the next two days, the daily count will go up to 80,000 and in a few days, we will clock 1 lakh vaccination a day. This largely depends on supply of vaccination to the district,” he said.