Uttarakhand 'gram pradhans' to ensure monitoring, quarantine of returnees to villages

Dehradun (Uttarakhand) [India], May 5 : Uttarakhand government has, as per new guidelines for lockdown, made village heads (gram pradhans) responsible for the monitoring and quarantine of persons returning to villages.
According to an official statement by the Uttarakhand government, Chief Secretary Utpal Kumar Singh has stated that in view of COVID-19 outbreak village heads have been given important responsibilities by the state government.
"District administration will register the information of the people returning to the state. This information will be shared with village heads. It will be the responsibility of the concerned village chief to register people who directly reach villages without getting registered at the district level. It will be their responsibility to ensure that the Aarogya Setu app is downloaded on the returnees' mobile phone," the statement said.
The Chief Secretary has stated that 'gram pradhans' will also be responsible to make 14-day quarantine facility available to returnees at the nearest school, panchayat house or other community centres.
They should also share the list of quarantined people with district officials, it added.
Regular health check-up of the persons quarantined will be conducted under the supervision of the Chief Medical Officer of the concerned district.
The persons guilty of not following the directives given by the village head will be punished under the provisions mentioned in the Epidemic Diseases Act, 1897 and Uttarakhand Epidemic Diseases COVID-19 Regulations, 2020, the directive added.