Night curfew extended till April 30 in 10 urban areas of Rajasthan

Jaipur, Apr 9: The Rajasthan government on Friday extended night curfew in 10 urban areas till April 30 and its timing, amid a spike in COVID-19 cases in the state.

The night curfew timing will be from 8 pm to 6 am in nine urban areas of Ajmer, Alwar, Bhilwara, Chittorgarh, Dungarpur, Jaipur, Jodhpur, Kota and Abu Road and markets will close by 7 pm, while in Udaipur, the curfew will be there from 6 pm to 6 am and markets will close by 5 pm, according to an order.

Earlier, the night curfew timing was from 10 pm to 6 am and it was till April 19.

The decision was taken in a COVID-19 review meeting chaired by Chief Minister Ashok Gehlot.

On Friday, the state reported 3,970 fresh coronavirus cases and 12 deaths.

Gehlot also directed officials to ensure "zero-mobility" in micro-containment zones in the state to prevent the spread of the coronavirus.

He also gave directions to increase testing and contact tracing of positive patients to break the transmission chain of the virus.

Directions have also been issued to stop regular classes in schools up to Class IX in rural areas and their adjoining urban areas, according to a statement.

In the meeting, it was decided that a state-level ''Corona War Room'' will be set up along with district-level control rooms, it said.

The ''181'' helpline number of the state will be operational for 24 hours; testing will be increased in areas with more than five per cent positive rate of the infection and teams will take stricter action on violation of COVID protocols, the statement said.

The chief minister said that the areas turning into COVID hot-spots should be identified and declared as micro containment zones as per rules.

He said that special focus will have to be given on preventing movement of people in such areas.

Health Secretary Siddharth Mahajan said that sampling has been increased to 55,000 tests per day and the target is to increase it to 1 lakh per day by the end of this month.