Chandigarh, June 22 – A state-level control room set up by various departments on the initiative of Haryana Chief Minister, Mr. Manohar Lal to exchange information related to Corona pandemic during the nationwide lockdown received 4,78,369 calls, of which 4,54,000 calls were answered from March 24 to June 21, 2020.

Giving information in this regard, an official spokesman said that out of the total calls received, 1,40,096 calls were related to health and 3,06,684 calls were general. He said that 95 percent of the calls were successfully answered with an average waiting time of less than 10 seconds. Similarly, tele-counseling was also made available to 31,592 persons.

It is noteworthy that in a meeting of Chief Ministers, held under the Chairmanship of the Union Home Minister Mr. Amit Shah, the Health Secretary appreciated state-level control room set up for better arrangements made by Haryana during Covid-19 and for helping and supporting the citizens.

This control room was set up under the guidance of Chief Secretary Mrs. Keshni Anand Arora and Additional Chief Secretary, Power Department Mr. T.C. Gupta. Besides this, efforts of its core team comprising senior IAS officer Mr. Vikas Gupta, senior HCS officer Mr. Samwartak Singh, Mr. Rohit Yadav, Mr. Vijay Malik and Call Center Incharge Mr. Puneet Sehgal and Mrs. Meenu have also been appreciated.

During this time, the calls were mainly related to Health Department, Transport and Food and Supplies Department. For enquiries related to health and Corona, the caller was given information while the calls related to ration and food packets were forwarded to the nodal officers at district-level through WhatsApp. Similarly, regarding calls related to interstate or intrastate movement, the caller was informed to stay at home during lockdown and curfew and to adhere to social distancing norms. In addition, callers were also informed about the Movement Pass.

Calls related to non-compliance of law and order and lockdown norms were passed on to the Nodal Officer of DSP rank of the Police Department by the Control Room, who exchanged information with the officers posted at the District level of the Police Department.