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‘Is Complete Lockdown Possible in Chennai,’ Madras HC Asks TN Govt

Chennai alone has over 70% of the total cases and deaths in the state.

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The Madras High Court on Thursday, 11 June asked the Tamil Nadu government if complete lockdown could be implemented only in Chennai, citing an ‘alarming situation’ due to rising number of cases of COVID-19.

Chennai alone has over 70 percent of the total cases and deaths in the state.

"Therefore, we want to know whether the government has devised any special scheme, which includes complete lockdown or curfew to contain the spread in Chennai and surrounding areas for sometime," a bench of Justices Vineet Kothari and R Suresh Kumar asked state government pleader V Jayaprakash Narayan during the virtual court proceedings after concluding listed cases.

Narayan has sought time till Friday for getting instructions from the government.

“No further decision has been taken. I will get instructions from the special officer J Radhakrishnan, who has been appointed to coordinate COVID-19 work in Chennai, and other officials on the latest development by tomorrow,” he told the court.

The high court’s observation comes as the state grapples with claims of underreporting of cases and deaths due to COVID-19.

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Chief Minister Edappadi K Palaniswami ruled out any deliberate underreporting of death cases. He said there is nothing to hide and the death figures cannot be hidden.

Nevertheless, the work on reconciliation of COVID-19 death figures in Chennai has begun with the Greater Chennai Corporation (GCC).

The move came following discrepancies noticed in the toll after it was estimated that deaths at individual homes due to the virus were perhaps going unreported.

“An expert committee has been constituted and it will go into the details of the data submitted by the GCC,” TS Selvavinayagam, Director, Directorate of Public Health and Preventive Medicine, told news agency IANS.

He said the members of the committee will get the data from GCC.

(With inputs from The News Minute and IANS.)

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Topics:  Chennai   Coronavirus 2019 

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