The State government on Sunday revised the list of districts in each zone to be in sync with what the Centre had classified on Friday with respect to COVID-19.
This drastically brings down the number of districts in red zone from 14 to 3 in the State, while it increases marginally the number of districts in green zone from 12 to 14.
With the new classification, only Bengaluru city, Bengaluru rural, and Mysuru remain in red zone. The new categorisation is expected to help a large number of businesses with the third phase of lockdown coming into effect from Monday. Districts such as Bagalkot, Belagavi, Dharwad, Kalaburagi, Bidar, Gadag, Vijayapura, Chickballapur, Mandya, Dakshina Kannada, and Tumakuru, which were in red zone, now fall under orange zone.
When the Centre on Friday released the list, it differed in numbers as Karnataka had an existing criteria to classify districts. The new categorisation for the State came with an order from Chief Secretary T.M. Vijay Bhaskar.
Though districts such as Davangere and Belagavi have reported positive cases in the last fortnight, they have been classified under orange zone.
“The change is owing to new categorisation by the Union government. The Karnataka government has adopted it,” said Munish Moudgil , officer in charge of State COVID-19 war room. He said: “The categorisation continues to be further evaluated by the State government.”
On categorisation of districts that still have active cases in orange zone, Mr. Moudgil said these points have been reported to the Union government. “The new list (categorisation) comes once in a week. The State government is examining the issue.”
