Indore
With Covid-19 cases growing again, Indore Municipal Corporation (IMC) has intensified drive to penalise people found without wearing mask while being outdoors.
From June 2020 till now, IMC imposed spot fine on a total of 73,529 Covidiots - mostly those found without masks in public places.
As per the breakup provided by IMC, 68,791 citizens were penalised for not wearing mask, 4,331 for not following social distancing and 407 commercial establishments were also penalised for not keeping sanitiser. A total Rs 96 lakh was realised as fine from the Covidiots.
In March so far, the IMC imposed fine on as many as 9,183 people and recovered fine of Rs 4.65 lakh. All these people were penalised for not wearing mask.
Earlier, IMC used to penalise people for not maintaining social distancing and establishments for not keeping sanitiser. As of now, the IMC is not doing that.
Municipal commissioner Pratibha Pal said that IMC is making all possible efforts to check spread of Covid-19, but the citizens also need to cooperate. She stated that the civic body had carried out fogging to disinfect different places from April and June last year.
During the same period, the IMC had also made people aware of necessity to wear a mask and maintaining social distancing.
“After lockdown was lifted, initially we complied with Covid-19 protocol but now many are breaching the protocol due to which cases of coronavirus infection is increasing again,” she said.
She said that many people are not even meeting the basic requirement of wearing mask.
Recently, MP Shankar Lalwani, divisional commissioner and corporation administrator Dr Pawan Kumar Sharma, collector Manish Singh and Pal appealed to the citizens to compulsorily wear masks in crowded markets around Rajwada and they also distributed masks to people who were not wearing one.
They had also given instructions to IMC for imposing fine if citizens still were not heeding to the appeals of wearing a mask.
In the last fortnight, the IMC imposed fine on more than 9000 people to check
One lakh pamphlets distributed
Pal said that following orders of Chief Minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan and crisis committee meeting decisions, IMC is running a campaign to educate people about prevention from coronavirus infection. More than 25 auto-rickshaws fitted with a sound system are appealing to people to follow Covid-19 strictly. These auto-rickshaws are reaching every nook and corner of the city. They are especially found at major markets, major crossroads, major colonies and settlements.
She also said that they have distributed more than 1 lakh pamphlets for creating awareness among people about Covid-19 and urging them to wear a mask, adhere to social distance, hand washing and using sanitiser etc.
