Who ordered the four-day complete lockdown & why?

Julie Mariappan & U Tejonmayam TNN

Chennai:26.04.2020

As people in several cities poured out on to the streets, gearing up for a lockdown within a lockdown, and police watched helplessly, the question uppermost was: Whose brainwave was it and what was the rationale behind it. Did not the policymakers foresee such a situation when they announced a ‘total’ lockdown in Chennai, Coimbatore, Madurai, Salem and Tirupur?

Officials say it was chief minister Edappadi K Palaniswami who first mooted the idea to discipline violators. Concerns about the rising Covid-19 positive numbers in the three cities and failure on the part of the general public to respect the lockdown norms prompted Palaniswami to make the declaration, admit officials. “It was the chief minister’s idea, backed by a core team, including senior police officers. In fact, the CM wanted to extend the total lockdown to the entire state,” said an official, seeking anonymity.

On Friday morning, the chief minister convened a meeting of senior officials including chief secretary K Shanmugam, director general of police J K Tripathy and Chennai police commissioner A K Viswanathan. The concern of police officers was that there was no meaning of a lockdown with all relaxations in place with people moving freely on the roads. The Chennai police had to block much of Anna Salai on Thursday due to huge increase in vehicular traffic. The officials advocated stricter measures.

“When the officers talked about people violating the lockdown, the CM suggested total lockdown until May 3. When it was pointed out that April 30 is salary day and the following three days were government holidays, the CM then suggested that the total lockdown be enforced until April 29,” another source said. The corporations were chosen based on population density, movement of traffic and inputs from the police.

Greater Chennai Corporation officials said stern action had been directed against shops and people flouting norms and shops monitored throughout the day. But officials had failed miserably to foresee the utter chaos that reigned for several hours on Saturday with people rushing to stock up on essentials, cocking a snook at the establishment. “In the coming four days, the monitoring will be stricter,” said a corporation officer.

Meanwhile, health experts have strongly advocated a staggered exit of the lockdown. While the lockdown measures may reduce the transmission, its effects are temporary as once the lockdown is lifted, the cases will increase, said chairman of the scientific advisory committee of the National Institute of Epidemiology Dr Jayaprakash Muliyil. “It will be like a Yo-Yo, going up and down,” he said.

Muliyil said the right way to reduce the transmission was to encourage and educate people to protect themselves by maintaining a distance from each other, washing hands and wearing masks. At this stage in Tamil Nadu, the state is unlikely to get rid of the virus completely, he said.

“Lockdown is not going to get us anywhere, but will probably prolong the agony. I am not privy to the information with the government, so I suppose there must be some reason for the government to do it,” said Muliyil.

(With inputs from Srikkanth D)

Concerns about rising Covid cases and failure of the general public to respect the lockdown norms prompted the CM to declare a four-day total lockdown, admit officials