india

Updated: Apr 27, 2020 13:07 IST

Haryana home minister Anil Vij termed the people who work in the national capital but stay in Haryana as “corona-carriers”. He has appealed to the Delhi government to make staying arrangement for such people there itself.

“Many who work in Delhi and stay in Haryana, are ‘corona-carriers’. I appeal to Delhi CM that staying arrangements of people who work in Delhi should be made in Delhi itself. They shouldn’t be issued passes to travel to Haryana as this is increasing Covid-19 cases here,” said the minister.

Coronavirus cases in Haryana rose to 296 on Sunday after nine people, according to a state health department bulletin.

Nuh with 57 novel coronavirus cases, followed by Gurgaon (51), Faridabad (45), Palwal (34), Sonipat (20) and Panchkula (18) are among the worst affected districts in Haryana.

The minister said it has come to light that many of the coronavirus patients in the NCR districts including Sonipat, Gurgaon and Faridabad have been found to have contracted infection from the national capital and said daily movement of the employees working in Delhi to their residences in Haryana increases the risk of Covid-19 spread.

“Haryana’s Chief Secretary Keshni Anand Arora on Sunday apprised her Delhi counterpart about the situation, saying this kind of movement has to be stopped and Delhi government should not issues passes to these employees for movement,” said Vij.

According to the bulletin, 199 people have been discharged from hospitals after recovery from the infection, leaving 94 active cases in the state.

“First, it was Tablighi Jamaat members who led to spike in number of cases in Haryana as 120 of them were found positive. Now, it is the movement of these employees from the national capital to their residences in Haryana which is increasing the threat of infection in the state,” Vij said.

As on Sunday evening, the state has a recovery rate of 67.22 per cent, fatality rate of 1.01 per cent, COVID-19 positive rate (proportion of positive cases to total tests conducted) of 1.51 per cent, the doubling rate of cases is 18 days, while tests per million being conducted are 846, the bulletin said.

In another development, MNCs, BPOs and IT enabled services (ITES) in Gurgaon may have to allow their employees to work from home till the end of July, said Gurgaon Metropolitan Development Authority CEO V S Kundu.

Gurgaon, which is part of the National Capital Region, is known as the millennium city and is home to many BPOs, MNCs and technology giants, including Infosys, Genpact, Google and Microsoft.