With COVID-19 cases continuing to increase daily, the State government has made it mandatory to obtain permission from deputy commissioners for booking community halls/convention centres/auditoriums for conducting weddings and other programmes.
Revenue Minister R. Ashok, Home Minister Basavaraj Bommai and Health and Family Welfare Minister K. Sudhakar on Saturday held a three-hour-long video conference with deputy commissioners and senior officials of the Health Department and instructed them to strictly implement the COVID-19 related orders issued by the government.
After the meeting, Mr. Ashok and Mr. Bommai told presspersons that all those who are booking community halls and convention centres for marriages and other programmes from April 17 should obtain prior permission from the respective deputy commissioners. The deputy commissioner’s office would issue 100 passes and 200 passes respectively for indoor and outdoor weddings.
In the case of community halls/auditoriums already booked, there was no necessity of obtaining permission and passes from deputy commissioners. But organisers have to limit the number of people as stipulated by the government.
According to an order issued by the government on Thursday, 100 people are allowed for weddings conducted indoors and 200 people for weddings organised outdoors.
Mr. Bommai said FIRs would be registered against owners of community halls/auditoriums if they violated the COVID-19 rules. Such halls would also be ordered to close, he said.
The police too would be posted at the community halls to check the number of people attending the weddings and other programmes. Only pass holders would be allowed to attend weddings.
Mr. Ashok said deputy commissioners have been instructed to ban all religious festivals/temple jatras. They have been told to issue orders soon for banning festivals to be held in May or June.
Following a surge in cases in Bengaluru, Chief Minister B.S.Yediyurappa, who tested positive for COVID-19 and receiving treatment in Manipal Hospital, would hold a video conference with city MLAs and top officials on Monday to find out solutions for containing the spread of the virus.
All-party meeting postponed
With Mr. Yediyurappa testing positive, an all-party meeting convened by the government on Sunday for discussing steps to be taken for containing the spread of the virus has been postponed.
Meanwhile, Chief Secretary P. Ravi Kumar has issued an order directing all department heads to control/regulate the number of meetings being organised for the next one or two months. In the case of necessity, he told officials to conduct meetings through video conference or by maintaining social distance. Only officials who are not having any symptoms should participate in the department meetings, he said.
