Pune Lockdown: PMC stops ration supplies to 25,000 people in Yerwada
Mehab Qureshi
Pune, May 26, 2020: The Pune Municipal Corporation (PMC) has decided to discontinue the delivery of grocery kits to over 25000 households in Yerwada. The civic body has to consider and make this decision because the slum residents violate the social distancing protocols.
Not only Yerwada slums have been the most affected with the COVID-19, but also the discontinuation of ration food supplies can result in complete starvation of the slum dwellers. The Yerwada containment zone consists of Jai Bhawani Nagar, Gandhi Nagar, Jai Prakash Nagar, Ram Nagar,Yerawada Gaothan, New Khadki.Parnakuti, Gadital, Pandu Laman Vasti, Subhash Nagar, Ashok Nagar, Laxmi Nagar, and Kamraj Nagar.
Besides, to ensure that the residents do not move from these areas, steel barricades have been installed. The officials decided to deliver door to door supplies of groceries to families. Still, only after a week of distribution, which was in the second week of May, the civic body has now decided to suspend the delivery for an unspecified time. The civic body officials also said that whenever the food supplies were distributed, a massive gathering would come, recklessly violating social distancing norms. Some would break the barricades and take multiple ration supplies.
Vijay Landge, the assistant commissioner of the Yerwada ward office said that ration kits distribution has been stopped as people were not following physical distancing whenever we went for distribution. People were not wearing masks, which was dangerous to for the staffs. Also, this could lead to the spread of the coronavirus once again, which beats the intention of the stringent lockdown and the containment entirely. The ration kits will be redistributed after better management.
