By PTI
RISHIKESH: The compulsory requirement of registering online to get a vaccine shot is coming in the way of labourers and their families getting inoculated as they are mostly illiterate and do not have gadgets, according to officials.
The SOP issued by the Uttarakhand government has kept the movement of labourers in the organised and unorganised sectors free even during a curfew to keep construction works going unhindered, but there is no arrangement yet on how labourers and their families will get vaccinated.
“The government has made it clear that online registration is a must to get the vaccine. Poor labourers who are mostly uneducated and illiterate find it difficult to register online for vaccination.
They do not even have the gadgets that are needed for online registration,” Assistant Labour Commissioner KL Gupta said.
Around seven thousand labourers are registered in Rishikesh who work on different projects in the town and the nearby rural areas, he said.
Apart from that, thousands of labourers are also engaged separately in the laying of Rishikesh-Karanprayag rail line and the chardham all weather road project.
“As they are also privately engaged by people at their homes for building purposes apart from working on big government projects, labourers can be potential super spreaders of the virus if they remain unvaccinated and keep moving from one place to another,” Gupta said.
If the problem is not addressed urgently, it may also undo all that has been done so far to control spread of the second wave of COVID-19, he added.
The assistant labour commissioner said he is going to bring this problem to the notice of his department head so that something is done without much delay to resolve it.
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