Rajasthan makes masks compulsory in urban areas, mandis

Jaipur : Rajasthan Chief Minister Ashok Gehlot said it should be ensured that people compulsorily wear mask in 196 urban areas (municipal corporations, municipalities and municipal councils) and agriculture markets (mandis) of the state to prevent spread of corona pandemic.

He asked the officials to continue working for success in controlling corona in Rajasthan. He directed them to implement the 'Bhilwara Model' in Jaipur, Jodhpur, Bikaner, Churu, Tonk, Jhunjhunu, Banswara and other districts to control the situation.

Gehlot was reviewing the situation of corona infection the state including Jaipur through video conference from his official residence on Thursday. He said that curfew should be strictly imposed in 38 areas and no person, including the government employees, should be allowed to either enter or exit the curfew areas.

He said that screening, testing and other arrangements should be made in Ramganj and other densely populated areas of Jaipur including Bhatta Basti, Amritpuri, Kho-Nagorian or Moti Dungari.

Chief Minister said that apart from the walled city, wherever corona positive cases have been found, the residents of nearby houses should be kept in home quarantine. Buildings of big educational institutions, hotels, hospitals and other institutes in the outer areas of Jaipur should be identified and utilised for quarantine.

He said that all necessary amenities should be extended to the people living in quarantine and protocol should be strictly followed. Jaipur Development Commissioner T Ravikanth would be the in-charge of all quarantine facilities in the city.

Gehlot asked for installing cameras for effective online monitoring of corona infection in hotspot regions. This would help in strict monitoring of the movement of people.

He said that if this experiment resulted success in the walled city, the same would be replicated at other places as well. He stated that drone cameras should be used for effective monitoring and action should be initiated against those violating the protocol of social distancing.

CM instructed for cluster sampling in corona infected areas in the walled city. Proper arrangements should be made for this by dividing the entire area into 30 clusters and 30 samples should be collected from each cluster.

Doing this, most of the infection in the area could be detected and then it would be easy to take effective steps in checking spread of the disease. He further asked to keep five mobile medical units ready all the time in the affected areas.