Curfew move gets thumbs down

Dushyant Singh Pundir

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Tribune News Service

Chandigarh, July 21

Not many people in the city are in favour of the weekend curfew being considered by the UT Administration keeping in view a sudden increase in the number of Covid-19 cases in the city.

To check the spread of the virus, the UT Administration was planning to impose a total curfew from 7 pm on Friday to 6 am on Monday.

UT Adviser Manoj Parida had written to the Chief Secretaries of Punjab and Haryana to agree to the UT proposal for a total curfew in the tricity during weekends. However, both states had turned down the proposal.

The UT Administrator will take a final call on the lockdown tomorrow.

“The proposed curfew is absolutely not needed. It will be disastrous for economy. It would lead to unemployment and increase in crime,” said Naveen Manglani, president, Chamber of Chandigarh Industries. He said the UT Administration should use the police to ensure people wear a mask or maintain social distance, especially in congested areas, rather than challaning vehicles.

“Challaning vehicles is not going to prevent Covid. It has been established that we have to control the virus while living with it and not by shutting down everything,” he added.

Favouring a complete lockdown, Vikas Jain, an advocate, said, “The weekend curfew is not pragmatic to prevent the spread of Covid. At least 14 to 21-day lockdown is necessary to break the chain of the virus. It will prevent the in-house gatherings and assemblies that are enabling the transmission of the virus in the community. Unless and until borders of the tricity are closed, all efforts towards combating the virus will be futile.”

Dr Rajesh Dhir, former president, Indian Medical Association, UT, said strict restrictions were needed to contain the virus and the weekend curfew would be part of the stringent restrictions only. “To break the chain, the Administration should go for a complete lockdown for 14 days and screen the entire population, so that positive cases are identified in one go,” he said.

Dr KK Talwar, former Director, PGI, said with the passage of time, people forgot the guidelines issued for the containment of the virus. People move in groups at crowded places like Sukhna Lake, Rose Garden, etc, he said. The weekend curfew would remind them that the invisible enemy had not vanished from the city. He said the weekend curfew would not affect the economy as such, but it would definitely restrict the social gatherings.

Charanjiv Singh, chairman, Chandigarh Beopar Mandal, said, “We are not in favour of a lockdown or curfew in the whole city either on the weekends or for any longer period as it will be a blow to the already-struggling business community. Markets are still waiting for customers. The Administration should concentrate on awareness and enforcement drives to make people observe safety measures.”

Prem Garg, president, Aam Aadmi Party, Chandigarh, said the weekend lockdown was not going to prove effective in containing the spread of Covid in any form. The lockdown was just some time given for making preparations to deal with the pandemic and not a solution to it, he added. The Administration would have to understand the ground realities. The poor and the labourers would have to suffer again and at the same time, the traders of the city would be ruined, Garg said.