The fourth phase of the nation-wide lockdown in India ended on May 30th and the lockdown has been extended in most places with some relaxations in specific states. Tamil Nadu has allowed a lot of relaxations in the state, except in four districts - Chennai, Kancheepuram, Tiruvallur and Chengalpattu. Recently, the Tamil Nadu government allowed government buses to ply between districts after the entire state was split into eight zones with permission for the buses to travel inter-district within their specific zones, about 6 of them.

Is TN decision to allow inter-district bus travel safe?

Some experts question this decision of the government to allow inter-district travel as some of the districts in the zones where travel has been allowed, still have hundreds of cases of COVID patients while many have just a few. For example - Salem has about 150 cases while the neighbouring districts like Coimbatore, Erode, Karur, Tiruppur and Namakkal have only a few cases. The arrival of migrants from other districts, states and countries has lead to a sharp increase of COVID cases and some experts feel that allowing inter-district transportation is similar to this and would lead to an increase in the COVID cases. Let's wait and watch...