VIJAYAWADA: Hailing the Election Commission of India (ECI) decision to postpone Rajya Sabha elections in view of COVID-19, Leader of the Opposition and TDP chief N Chandrababu Naidu has urged the State government to put off the budget session of the Assembly, which is scheduled to be held from March 27.
Addressing a press conference on Tuesday, he said if the Assembly is convened and people’s representatives get together and if something happens, it will be a historic blunder. "I request the government to take the advise of experts and look for an alternative option," he said.
Expressing concern over the fast spread of COVID-19, he said in the first 67 days, the virus spread to one lakh people, but in the last 11 days the number of cases increased to two lakh.
He said all the foreign returnees should have been quarantined as soon as they arrived in the country. But, they were allowed to go with advice for home quarantine. “It should not have been the case. Mandatory quarantine should have been imposed,” he opined.
Stating that personal hygiene and social distancing are the two things that need to be done by everyone, the TDP chief called upon people to follow the Centre’s guidelines to check the spread of the virus. Stating that just isolation wards in the hospitals for COVID-19 suspected are not sufficient, he urged the government to set up dedicated hospitals for COVID-19 treatment.
He said in the current digital era, where inter-personal communication becomes easy, working from home is not a problem.“It should be digital socialisation instead of a physical one. We all can communicate with one another over social media platforms like WhatsApp, Twitter and so on. At the same time, awareness on dos and don’t can be created among people through social media,” he explained.