Received over five lakh suggestions for lockdown 4.0: Arvind Kejriwal

New Delhi: Warning that the coming time will be difficult for the city and its people, Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal on Thursday said he received more than five lakh suggestions for the relaxations in lockdown 4.0, to be implemented from next week.

Addressing the media, Kejriwal said the lockdown was announced on March 24.

"It has been 1.5 months and in this period almost the entire country and city was shut. Closing everything was easy but opening the economy will be very difficult. We need to work very hard now. The coming time will be very difficult for us," he said.

Kejriwal said his government received more than five lakh suggestions from the public and after analysing them, he will send the suggestions to the Centre.

"We will have different rules from Monday as per Centre's guidelines," he said.

The Chief Minister said he will have a meeting with Delhi Lt. Governor at 4 p.m. on Thursday to discuss the suggestions.

"We are aiming to send the response by Thursday evening to the Centre. When Centre demanded a response from us on the relaxations, I felt this should not be decided in an AC room and so I wanted the suggestions from the public. More than 5 lakh suggestions were received till Wednesday evening."

Sharing what the people have demanded, Kejriwal said most of the people are saying that educational institutes should remain closed at least till the summer break."The takeaway of food should be allowed while dining at the restaurants should remain shut. Majority of people are demanding that salons, barber shops, cinema halls should remain shut. Almost all said that heart patients, sugar or cancer patients and the senior citizens should remain indoors."

He said the people also demanded that wearing masks and social distancing should be a must.

"On public transport, people have given suggestions. They want autos, buses and taxis with strict social distancing."

People are also demanding metro with limited people.

"The market associations are saying that the markets and market complexes should be opened. People are saying malls should be opened with limited shops. Industry associations too demanded that they should be allowed."

The lockdown announced on March 24 was to end on April 14. It was extended to May 3 and later to May 17. The Centre is now having discussions on the picture post May 17.