Armed with sticks, women guard hamlet against coronavirus in Jammu

Armed with sticks, women at a hamlet in Jammu stand guard atentry points, which have been blocked by barbed wires, as they have taken itupon themselves to ensure a complete lockdown and prevent outsiders’ entry intotheir hamlet to keep the residents safe from coronavirus.

Both mothers and daughters in the hamlet, barely a fewkilometers away from Jammu city, have taken up this task as the number ofcoronavirus cases have shown an increase in the winter capital.

   

A 61-year-old woman succumbed to coronavirus at theGovernment Medical College Hospital in Jammu on Wednesday, taking the deathtoll due to COVID-19 to four in Jammu and Kashmir. This is the first death inthe Jammu region as the other three deaths took place in Kashmir.

While Jammu has accounted for 36 positive cases so far, theunion territory reported 188 coronavirus cases. Twenty-four cases were reportedon Thursday.

For the past few days, a group of women, led by formersarpanch Gurmeet Kour, are guarding their hamlet from 9 am to 4 pm along with afew policemen at the barbed wire blocked entry points to the locality whichhouses over 6,500 people.

“COVID-19 is a deadly disease. It is our duty tosupport our police force and government in this war against coronavirus. So wehave taken up the role to guard our small locality and insulate it from anyoutside contact,” Kour told PTI.

She added that despite awareness, some people don’t take anyprecaution and keep roaming which not only can infect them, in case of anycontact, but their family and locality as well.

“We want to keep our locality safe as cases in Jammuare increasing,” she said.

Harmeet, 55, said that police cannot guard villages,locality or lanes to ensure lockdown.

“We felt it is our duty to contribute a bit by guardingour locality and relieving the police which is performing a large-scale duty inthe time of lockdown. At least we can guard our own area.” she said.

The number of red zones declared by the administration inJammu and Kashmir has also witnessed a sharp jump taking the count to 45.

The number of red zones, areas which are a cluster ofCOVID-19 cases, has seen a spurt during the last few days. Of the total redzones, 26 are located in Kashmir division while rest are in Udhampur, Rajouri,Samba and Jammu, according to an official source.

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