AP Grama Sachivalayam employees exempted from biometric attendance amid rise in covid-19 cases

The state government has exempted village and ward secretariat staff and volunteers from biometric attendance in the wake of the coronavirus. Narayana Bharat Gupta, Director, Department of Village and Ward Secretariats, issued the directives on Monday. Earlier, the orders were issued that biometric attendance will be mandatory for employees of village and ward secretariats from April 1.

"Village and ward volunteers were also asked to register attendance on biometric; but now in the wake of the corona outbreak, we are suspending the connection of salaries with biometric attendance to the employees of the village and ward Sachivalayam," Bharat Gupta said,

He further added that these directives will remain in force till further orders. "The exemption also applies to village and ward volunteers," he said.

Meanwhile, In the lastest health bulletin released by the state government on Monday, as many as 14,986 new cases reported in the state out of 60,124 samples conducted. The total number of cases mounted to 13,02,589 cases. The death toll has also increased and about 84 people have been dead in the last twenty four hours as on Tuesday morning taking the total deaths to 8,791 while the recoveries has been increasing daily. About 16,167 people recovered from dreadful virus in the last twenty four hours and the active cases stands at 1,89,367 till date.