Bhubaneswar: The Odisha government has declared a complete lockdown in the state from Tuesday midnight to contain the spread of the deadly coronavirus.
Informing about the directive, the government chief spokesperson on COVID-19, Subroto Bagchi, said that keeping the rising number of patients afflicted with the disease in the country, the state government, as a precautionary measure has decided to enforce lockdown in the remaining 16 districts of the state.
“The state government will make an announcement to this effect at a press briefing at 4.30 pm today (Tuesday),” Bagchi told the media.
He also said that the collectors have been asked to vacate SC/ST students from hostels in their respective districts and make arrangements to hand them over to their parents and guardians by Tuesday evening.
On March 21, Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik had ordered a lockdown in Khurda, Ganjam, Cuttack, Kendrapara and Angul districts from 7 am on March 22 to 9 pm on March 29.
Later, the state government had extended the lockdown order in nine more districts of Puri, Nayagarh, Jagatsinghpur, Dhenkanal, Jajpur, Bhadrak, Balasore, Sambalpur and Jharsuguda with effect from the morning on March 23 till 9 pm on March 29.
Besides, lockdown was declared in the urban localities of Sambalpur, Jharsuguda, Balasore, Rourkela, Bhadrak, Puri, Jajpur Road, Jajpur Town, Brajarajnagar, Nabarangpur and Umerkote.
