Aarogya Setu, COVA apps must to enter malls in Mohali

Sanjay Bumbroo

Tribune News Service

Mohali, June 7

As malls in the district are set to open from tomorrow, managements have started giving training to their staff in managing visitors, besides sanitising the mall.

Shopkeepers were also given directions to have limited number of customers so as to maintain social distancing.

VR Punjab mall, one of the biggest malls in the Kharar area of Mohali, was sanitised today. The management also gave training to its staff in allowing only those visitors wearing face masks and checking their cell phones for COVA and Aarogya Setu apps. Restaurants or food courts in the mall will not operate except for takeaway/home delivery till 8 pm. Lifts will only be used by disabled persons or in medical emergency.

Rishab Mehrotra, centre head, VR Punjab mall, said: “The entire complex of the mall was sanitised today. The mall has the capacity to entertain 12,500 visitors daily. We will distribute tokens among visitors to maintain social distancing, besides undergoing thermal scanning at the entry point”.

He said shops and other areas in the mall were also sanitised. The staff had been given training in checking visitors’ cell phones to ensure that they had installed COVA and Aarogya Setu apps.

Mehrotra said they would be strictly following the guidelines of the Central as well as the state governments. Every person entering the mall should have COVA and Aarogya Setu apps on their cell phones. A family could be allowed to enter the mall if one of the members had COVA app installed in his/her cell phone. Entry to the mall would be based on the token system.

He said shop owners should have markers on the floor to indicate social distancing. In any case, there should not be a gathering of more than 20 persons in any shop.

Meanwhile, managements of religious places had made arrangements for thermal scanning of devotees.

Des Raj Gupta, treasurer, Sanatan Dharam Mandir, Phase IV, here, said: “We have sanitised the temple, which will open for devotees from Monday. We have installed a sanitiser dispenser at the entrance. Devotees will have to undergo thermal scanning. No one will be allowed to enter the temple without a mask. Devotees will not be allowed to make any kind of offerings in the temple.”

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