‘The younger population goes out for work, uses public transportation and hence, there are more chances of coming into contact with others. Many people are still not wearing masks or maintaining social distancing, which has contributed to the rise in cases,” said Suranjit Chatterjee, a senior consultant at Apollo Hospitals here.

“One month (of lockdown) is equivalent to about $5 billion of revenue for retailers from just Maharashtra,” Kumar Rajagopalan, CEO of the Retailers Association of India, told Reuters. “We are talking about 1.2 million stores and 5 million jobs.”

Rajagopalan said store shutdowns will hit sectors such as manufacturing, distribution and banking and have a snowball effect on the economy.

With 839 new Covid-related deaths in the last 24 hours, the toll in the country has mounted to 1,69,275. Currently, there are 11,08,087 active cases in the country.Five states — Maharashtra, Chhattisgarh, Karnataka, Uttar Pradesh and Kerala — cumulatively account for 70.82 per cent of India’s active COVID-19 cases which have breached the 11-lakh mark for the first time since the outbreak of the pandemic.

“Fourth wave of Covid-19 in Delhi has made the situation worse than what it was during the third peak. Over 10,000 Covid-19 cases were reported in Delhi in the last 24 hours, this is a worrisome situation, Kejriwal said.

“Similarly, 56 per cent of the CEOs expressed their concern over loss of production of up to 50% if there were restrictions on the ecosystem that supports movement of goods,” it added.

“Duration of the lockdown and how to handle its economic fallout was discussed during today’s meeting. The task force is of the view that the prevailing coronavirus situation in the state is such that a lockdown is required,” the minister said.