The Telangana government on Sunday extended the lockdown for another 10 days but with an increased daily relaxation time. The decision was taken at the state Cabinet meeting presided over by Chief Minister K Chandrasekhar Rao.

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The lockdown, which was to end on Sunday, has been extended for 10 days from May 31.

The Cabinet, however, decided to increase the relaxation from 6 am to 1 pm from present 6 am to 10 am. According to a statement from Chief Minister's Office, relaxation for one more hour will be given to enable people to return home. Thus, practically relaxation will be from 6 am to 2 pm.

The Chief Minister directed the administration to ensure strict implementation of the lockdown from 2 pm to 6 am the next day.

Before the Cabinet met, AIMIM chief Asaduddin Owaisi, in a tweet, urged KCR not to extend the lockdown by terming it as not a strategy to combat COVID-19 and said the only long-term solution to the pandemic is universal vaccination.

"Strongly urge @TelanganaCMO to not extend lockdown. If goal is to reduce crowding, then we may consider evening curfews (6 PM onwards) or mini-lockdowns for COVID clusters. But expecting 3.5 cr people to live for weeks with just a 4- hour lockdown relaxation is not fair at all," Owaisi said in a series of tweets.

The Hyderabad MP said as such, the COVID-19 cases were declining in Telangana even before the lockdown was announced from May 12.

The state government had announced a 10-day lockdown from May 12 to rein in the surge in coronavirus cases. This was later extended by another week. The decision for further extension of the lockdown was taken after the Cabinet felt that continuing the curbs for few more days would further help the state in checking the spread of Covid.

Industry and Information Technology Minister KT Rama Rao said the Cabinet also decided to allow limited revival of economic activity. Guidelines in this regard will be issued soon.