RAJKOT: Shopkeepers, showroom owners and roadside vendors too in Morbi town will have to mandatorily undergo RT-PCR tests every fortnight if they want to continue their business.
In a bid to curb crowding of people at one place and promote vaccination at the same time, the Morbi municipality has issued a notification stating that the business establishment will be sealed and roadside vendors forced to shut down if they don’t abide by the Covid-19 test rule.
The sealing drive will begin today as the municipality chief officer had given five days, beginning June 1, for all owners to get themselves tested.
In fact, the Morbi collector had made Covid tests including rapid antigen mandatory for all business establishment owners last month and police had started booking the violators under IPC section 188.
However, the municipality has gone a step forward stating that RT-PCR was more authentic.
When contacted, chief officer Girish Saraiya, said, “Shop owners are super spreaders as a large number of people gather in their premises.
The number of Covid cases have drastically reduced and people are seeing taking it easy again, something which may trigger the third wave.” “We gave them five days time to get tested.
Starting today, we will start sealing the establishments of violators” Saraiya added.
However, those who have taken at least one dose of vaccine are exempted from this rule.
“We also aim to promote vaccination by enforcing this mandatory RT-PCR rule,” the officer said.
According to sources, there are around 2,000 registered business establishments in Morbi town.
KP Joshi, resident additional collector said, “Our aim is not to harass the traders, but learn from the past experience when people let their guard down and cases spiked.
If traders have any issues, we will call a meeting and hear their grievances.” Morbi was the worst-hit during the second wave, mainly due to lack of enough beds and the Covid patients had to be shifted to Rajkot and Jamnagar.
There was no RT-PCR testing facility in Morbi till April and it was created only after the massive spike in infections.
Jayanti Patel, president of Morbi Chamber of Commerce and Industry, welcomed the municipality’s notification.
“Traders should take this positively.
Cases are under control at present, but this rule is necessary so that traders don’t infect their customers.”