DC urges socio-religious organisations to play active role in educating masses about preventions and precautions

Srinagar, June 07 (KNS): Continuing its Community Capacity Building initiative aimed at sensitisation about COVID-19 prevention the Srinagar district administration organised a series of conferences at Shalteng, Bemina, Panthachowk and Eidgah Tehsils.

Hundreds of clerics and heads of religious institutions including Mosques, Madarsa, Gurudwaras, Temples, Church and religious educational institutions attended the conferences wherein detailed deliberations were held about community capacity building and education with focus on educating masses about preventive measures to contain COVID spread.

Deputy Commissioner Srinagar Dr Shahid Iqbal Choudhary along with ADC Hanief Balkhi, SP West Shahzad Salaria, SDM West Hamida Akhter, Tehsildar Shalteng Ishfaq Khan deliberated on various aspects. Experts from Social and Preventive Medicine Dr Saleem Khan and Dr Rabbani Tariq dwelled on preventive measures to be adopted by public.

Speaking on the occasion the DC emphasised that public should be encouraged to stay indoors to prevent spread of COVID-19 disease and whenever leaving homes becomes necessary it should be indispensable and mandatory to wear masks at public places, adhere to physical distancing norms and avoid overcrowding. He highlighted the importance of adopting hygiene measures by all people and sought active collaboration of religious heads and clerics in spreading the massage in localities.

The participants pledged their active role in creating public awareness about precautions and preventive measures to be adopted for containing spread of COVID-19. A large number of speakers agreed to make appeals to public locally and also devoting time for public communication after Azaan (call for prayers). Pamphlets published in English, Urdu and Kashmiri were distributed with details about precautions to be adopted viz a viz hygiene, masks and physical distancing among others.

At Panthachowk, the Dr Shahid along with other officers including concerned Tehsildar Mohammad Younis Bangroo attended the meeting with religious representatives drawn from various areas including Khonmoh, Zevan, Panthachowk and Nowgam.

Later, three different sessions were organised for representatives from different areas at Tehsil Eidgah. The DC held detailed discussions with clerics and heads of religious institutions seeking their cooperation for educating every person in the vicinity about precautions. Printed material was also provided for distributions. SP North Syed Tahir Gilani, SDM and Tehsildar Eidgah Maeen Kakroo were present among other officers.

Earlier such conferences were held at Tehsil Khanyar and Tehsil North where hundreds of representatives from religious institutions and managements of places of worship participated.

The aim of these conferences among other is awareness initiatives that the Srinagar administration has been organising in the form of community outreach programmes and through the medium of social media is to elicit response from the public for mandatory adoption of protocols and SOPs aimed at prevention of COVID spread.(KNS)