LAHORE: With more Covid-19 cases brought to hospitals in Punjab, easing the lockdown has worried a lot of people.

“The government must rethink before easing the lockdown,” says Sana, a banker, of Garden Town.

“We cannot live normal lives with so many people testing positive around us, and so many lives being lost.”

She adds that the problem is worse in cities like Lahore so more care should be taken regarding the lockdown.

While so many people stick to following procedures, at the same time the lockdown seems to not be followed in most places in the city.

In a market near Bedian Road, life is running as usual. At 3pm on Friday, the area is so jampacked with people and cars that there is a traffic jam here. Vegetable and fruit vendors sit around with no masks or any concept of hand washing. Even the people who mill around the area buying food for iftar and other groceries, are not keeping any physical distance among themselves. One ‘dawakhana’ (herbal medicine shop) had people waiting outside for their turn standing in a crowd.

And yet not one law enforcement officer was seen in the area trying to implement the rules of the lockdown and making shopkeepers and the public observe the rules.

In a mart located off Bhatta Chowk, SOPs are being better observed. At the entrance a female guard is checking temperatures of every person who passes through the doors. Two men are made to stand outside because they do not have masks on them. Because it is a larger store, there is more physical distancing but when it comes to crossing people in the aisles, they just brush against each other not keeping a distance.

“It is surprising that people used to be keeping a good distance from each other in the very beginning of the lockdown, but now it seems as if our public has just become more and more desensitized, and have a ‘devil-may-care’ attitude,” says one of the shoppers here. “This is very strange considering cases are only rising now.”

Another woman says Lahore is the worst place in Punjab being the most populous – it will be catastrophic here.

In DHA Phase 6, it seems as if people are not very keen on following the SOPs.

“The shopkeepers here have been trying their best to do the most they could, but with the lockdown being eased, customers are bound to get worse about queues and following protocol in general,” says one of the residents of the area. “As soon as you exit a store, there are people waiting outside asking for alms in the form of money or ration.”

The traffic volume has gone up since the middle of April in several areas of Lahore. Only a handful of shops are following SOPs in these places much to the exasperation of some citizens. “The government has been trying to pretend that they have a lockdown situation here, when actually absolutely no one seems to be observing it. If anything, this seems to be affecting the working class the most, who are not allowed to travel to and from work, etc,” says one citizen, of Garden Town.

A representative of Punjab police told Dawn that they were bringing action on violations.

Since March 16, police established 1,028 pickets all over the province where 238,949 vehicles and 560,921 motorcycles have been checked. From these police pickets 1,138,344 citizens have been checked and 702,673 have been released on warning.

Security bonds have been taken from 46,933 citizens, whereas 23,190 citizens have been arrested through 25,027 FIRs lodged for violation of section 144. Around 26,284 citizens have been released on bail whereas actions have been taken against 4,587 shops and 238 restaurants. Police teams during the duty provided awareness on the virus to 5,337 people.

Published in Dawn, May 10th, 2020