India News | Bengal Wears Deserted Look on 2nd Day of Bi-weekly Lockdown
Get latest articles and stories on India at LatestLY. Normal life came to a grinding halt in West Bengal on Saturday as a complete lockdown was enforced across the state to break the chain of surging novel coronavirus cases.
Kolkata, Jul 25 (PTI) Normal life came to a grinding halt in West Bengal on Saturday as a complete lockdown was enforced across the state to break the chain of surging novel coronavirus cases.
All shops were shut and all modes of transport went off the roads as part of the state government's plan to clamp restrictions two days a week. A similar lockdown will take place place next Wednesday.
Only medicine shops and health establishments were allowed to remain open during the lockdown across the state.
Flight operations at the Kolkata airport were also suspended during the lockdown as the government had requested the Civil Aviation Ministry that no flights should operate during the lockdown.
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Police patrolled all major traffic intersections in the metropolis to keep a check on people coming out on the streets without any valid reason. Barricades were also put up in various parts of the state to stop people from coming out of their homes, officials said.
Public and private offices were closed and public transport was off the roads as the government has imposed restrictions on their plying. Commercial establishments and markets were also closed.
Several trains at Howrah and Sealdah stations have been also cancelled.
More than 3,800 people were arrested for flouting lockdown guidelines on Thursday when the first bi-weekly lockdown was enforced.
West Bengal has so far registered 53,973 COVID-19 cases and 1,290 deaths till Friday. PTI DC RG HMB 07251020 NNNN
“Any advanced notice of testing, in the form of a phone call or otherwise, provides an opportunity for athletes to engage in tampering or evasion or other improper conduct which can limit the efficacy of testing,” the AIU said in an e-mailed statement.
The AIU added that under World Anti-Doping Agency rules “proof that a telephone call was made is not a requisite element of a missed test and the lack of any telephone call does not give the athlete a defense to the assertion of a missed test.”
Some of Coleman's earlier missed tests were not with the AIU but with the U.S. Anti-Doping Agency, whose own handbook for athletes says phone calls are usually reserved only for the last five minutes of a time slot and “to confirm the unavailability of the athlete, not to locate an athlete for testing.”
Athletes are required to list their whereabouts for an hour each day when they must be available to be tested. A violation means an athlete either did not fill out forms telling authorities where they could be found, or that they weren't where they said they would be when testers arrived.
Coleman said in his post he has been appealing the latest missed test for six months with the AIU, which runs the anti-doping program for World Athletics. He explained there was no record of anyone coming to his home and that if he had been called he was only five minutes away.
It's the second time Coleman has faced a potential ban for a whereabouts violation. Coleman won the 100 meters at the world championships in Doha, Qatar, last September after the U.S. Anti-Doping Agency dropped his case for missed tests because of a technicality.
“I have never and will never use performance enhancing supplements or drugs,” Coleman wrote Tuesday.
“I am willing to take a drug test EVERY single day for the rest of my career for all I care to prove my innocence.” After winning the gold medal in Doha, Coleman said he needed to be more careful to keep track of his whereabouts.
“I haven't been careless. I think I can just be more mature about it, more diligent about updating the app. But I mean, I think everybody in this room is not perfect. Everybody has made mistakes,” he said.
“Going forward, I just try to do a better job about being more diligent about it.”
Coleman is the latest in a string of runners hit with whereabouts charges in 2020.
The AIU filed a similar charge this month against women's 400-meter world champion Salwa Eid Naser of Bahrain. She was already under investigation when she won gold in Doha last year in the fastest time since 1985.
Former U.S. national 200 champion Deajah Stevens was suspended in May. (AP)
(The above story is verified and authored by Press Trust of India (PTI) staff. PTI, India’s premier news agency, employs more than 400 journalists and 500 stringers to cover almost every district and small town in India.. The views appearing in the above post do not reflect the opinions of LatestLY)