Shivraj empowers villages to impose lockdown

Panchayat secys authorised to set up quarantine centres

The Madhya Pradesh government has empowered the panchayats in the state to impose corona curfew in the wake of a surge in Covid-19 cases.

Principal secretary of state panchayat and rural development department Umakant Umrao has issued a circular asking the district collectors and chief executive officers of the zila panchayats in the state to generate awareness among the villagers about corona curfew.

The villages have now been given the power to make a decision on the imposition of corona curfew in their area of jurisdictions keeping in view the pandemic situation and threat of spreading the virus by the migrant labourers who return back to their homes in the current reverse migration triggered by the second corona wave of coronavirus, a senior officer of the panchayat and rural development department said unwilling to be quoted since he was not authorised to speak to the media.

“We plan to encourage community-based initiatives in villages to tackle the pandemic in view of the looming reverse migration to rural Madhya Pradesh in coming days”, the officer said.

Panchayat secretaries have been authorised to establish quarantine Centres for the migrant labourers who return to their villages from other states during reverse migration and also asked to lodge FIR against those who refused to be quarantined.

Village community

Centres, schools and anganwadi Centres can be converted into quarantine Centres, the officer said.

Certain parts of rural MP have already witnessed the reverse migration of workers.

“At least 800 migrant workers have returned to their villages in Shahdol district in the past couple of weeks. We have already initiated the process of quarantining them outside their respective villages through communitybased initiatives. Besides, we have set in motion the move to provide employment to them under NREGS after their quarantine period”, Shahdol division commissioner Rajiv Sharma told this newspaper on Thursday.

People in at least 200 villages in the district have sealed their villages as part of the corona curfew imposed by them and made arrangements to quarantine the natives who returned their homes in reverse migration, outside their villages, official reports reaching here said.

MP on Thursday reported 12,384 fresh cases of coronavirus positive taking the tally of cases to 4,591,95.

The state on Thursday recorded 75 deaths taking the death toll to 4,863.

— PTI A replica of earth being cleaned by a worker on the banks of upper lake in Bhopal on Thursday. The Earth Day is being observed to demonstrate support to environmental protection for the theme “Restore Our Earth”.

— PTI Migrants arrive in Ranchi from Mumbai as they leave for their native places in Jharkhand amid rise in Covid-19 cases across the country on Thursday.