Nearly 1.8 lakh people have been booked and Rs 32.41 crore fine was imposed in August by the revenue department and the Delhi Police for not following Covid-appropriate behaviour and violating related guidelines

The Delhi Disaster Management Authority(DDMA) has authorised district magistrates and deputy commissioners of police, deputy commissioners of civic bodies and other officers to enforce Covid-appropriate behaviour, guidelines and other instructions in hotspots like markets, malls, restaurants, bus and railway stations.

Over 150 teams of the Delhi government’s revenue department as well as the Delhi Police teams nabbed nearly 1.80 lakh violators in August. These included 1.50 lakh by the revenue department teams and over 29,000 by the police, officials said.

The revenue department collected Rs 26.74 crore in fines and got 4,818 FIRs registered in August for violations like not wearing masks, crowding, spitting in public places and other such offences, official data showed.

The Delhi Police, imposed fines of Rs 5.6 crore and arrested 3,838 people for violations of national directives of COVID management.

The enforcement teams of the revenue department had imposed fines worth Rs 15.16 crore by issuing more than 85,000 challans for Covid-related violations in May. In June Rs 25.19 crore fine was imposed on 1.58 lakh violators. In July, over 2.11 lakh challans were issued and the fine amount soared to Rs 36.21 crore.

The violations caught by the Delhi Police were over 83,000 in May, 50,000 in June and 39,000 in July. The amount of fine imposed was Rs 15.94 crore in May, Rs 10.16 crore in June and Rs 67.5 lakh in July, the data showed.

(Cover: People flout Covid-19 protocols as they shop at Sarojini Nagar market, Delhi PHOTO: Getty )