Coronavirus: Lockdown in 7 districts of Kerala, 9 in Karnataka till March 31

The Karnataka and Kerala government on Sunday afternoon announced a complete lockdown in 16 districts till March 31.  Kerala has announced lockdown in seven districts and Karnataka has announced lockdown nine districts. 

The Kerala government on March 22 announced a lockdown in seven districts of the state. These districts include Thiruvananthapuram, Kasaragod, Ernakulam, Kannur, Malappuram, Kottayam and Pathanamthitta. Only essentials services will be allowed in these seven districts.

Karnataka has also called for a complete shutdown in 9 districts. The move is to stop the spread of the coronavirus pandemic. The districts which include the lockdown are Bengaluru, Bengaluru Rural, Mysuru, Kodagu, Dakshina Kannada (Mangaluru), Dharwad, Belagavi, Kalaburgi and Chikkablapur.

The move comes after the central and state governments decided to announce a lockdown in 75 districts across the country where coronavirus cases have been reported. The decisions have been taken at a high-level meeting attended by chief secretaries of all states and the cabinet secretary and the principal secretary to the Prime Minister. 

Other states, including Chhattisgarh, Punjab, Odisha have already announced complete lockdown until March 31

In order to contain the spread of COVID-19, it was decided to extend the restrictions on the movement of non-essential passenger transport, including inter-state buses till March 31. All train services have been suspended till March 31, 2020, including suburban rail services.