Coronavirus Lockdown: Many districts to get 'considerable relaxations' from May 4, says MHA

New Delhi, Apr 29: The Home Ministry announced that the new guidelines to fight Covid-19 will be issued effective May 4, which shall give considerable relaxations to many districts and the details regarding this shall be communicated in the days to come.

Till 3 May, however, the existing guidelines should be strictly followed, it added, pointing out that there have been "tremendous gains and improvement in the situation due to lockdown till now."

"MHA held a comprehensive review meeting on the #lockdown situation today. There've been tremendous gains & improvement in the situation due to lockdown till now. To ensure that these gains are not squandered away, the lockdown guidelines should be strictly observed till 3rd May," the Home Ministry spokesperson tweeted.

Currently, India is in the last week of the 40-day nationwide lockdown, which is scheduled to end on 3 May, 2020.

While announcing the lockdown, Prime Minister Narendra Modi had said people should remain wherever they are.

At the beginning of the first phase of the lockdown, thousands of the migrant workers had started moving by foot from cities like Delhi, Mumbai and Hyderabad to their respective places, creating a humanitarian crisis.

This led to the Home Ministry directing the state governments not to allow the migrants to move, arrange shelter homes for them and provide them food.

The government has already allowed industrial activities in rural areas with conditions. Similarly, apart from the shops for the essential commodities, standalone business establishments of non-essential goods were also allowed to open during the lockdown.

Earlier today, the MHA said that stranded migrant workers, pilgrims, tourists, students will be allowed to move with conditions during lockdown, giving a big relief to the distressed people.