Assam cautiously opens after 45 days

Assam today cautiously started a long uphill journey to return to normalcy amidst fear of a spike as the state joins the rest of the nation's green zone in slowly opening up the economy.

Assam has adopted "open by day and close by night" policy, slightly tweaking the national policy as it has prepared its populace for herd immunity keeping the young and senior citizens at home leaving the rest out in the open.

Lockdown 3.0. As per the National Directives, following are the guidelines to be followed by the people in the state of Assam, till May 17th , 2020, starting from tomorrow, May 4th. #StayHomeSaveLifes @CMOfficeAssam @assampolice pic.twitter.com/5Aszc2tew6

— Kumar Sanjay Krishna (@KrSanjayKrishna) May 3, 2020

The Government has announced a set of rules which is itself a maze but the citizens have realized that unless those are strictly followed a major spike is certain.

Assam has been relatively safe in the Corona battle from the rest of India but as thousands are returning from mainland India in the next few weeks there is a possibility of the spike as Assam hardly has any rapid testing facilities.

Assam is still forced to continue to with the symptomatic test knowing well that 80% of patients are asymptomatic as the ICMR withdrew the Rapid testing kit, which was imported from China and found faulty along with the PPEs.

তৃতীয় পৰ্যায়ৰ লকডাউনৰ সময়ছোৱাৰ বাবে ৰাজ্য চৰকাৰে গ্ৰহণ কৰা কিছুমান গুৰুত্বপূৰ্ণ সিদ্ধান্ত ।
Government of Assam releases fresh operational guidelines for Lock Down 3.#Lockdown3 pic.twitter.com/gpnfrqdOri

— SiddharthaBhttachrya (@SBhttachrya) May 3, 2020

This morning people come out with a vengeance as both private and government offices are going to run with 60% capacity and all the manufacturing units are back to normal only with the condition that by 6 p.m everybody is to be inside the home.

For the row shops by the side of the road, every third shop will remain open. However, stand-alone will remain open. Moreover, since morning ASTC have started long-distance busses from across the state and all are culminating by evening.

Most of these busses are point to point bus with no stoppagein between for dropping and picking.  TheCity busses have also started with 50% capacity and the OLA and UBER are backin the road besides Auto Rickshaws and E-rickshaws.

This is an attempt to revive the economy and Government expects that by another 2-3 months the economy will fall in line. Meanwhile, the restaurants are open but there is no seating arrangement. The hotel, barbershops, gyms and salons are yet to open.