As offenders continue to violate lockdown, womenfolk in Jammu have picked hockey sticks to ‘teach a lesson’ to those who are unnecessary stepping out ‘just for entertainment’, amid shutdown.

On the outskirts of Jammu, ex-Sarpanch of Chatha, Gurmeet Kour, has taken this initiative and within no time a large number of women came forward to be party to the “guarding team” to enforce lockdown in their localities.

One can see hockey sticks- and lathi-wielding women patrol the streets of Chatha and adjoining localities forcing lockdown offenders to stay inside. As deployment of cops in every nook and corner is not possible, this bold step of womenfolk has helped the administration to effectively enforce the lockdown.

“Since imposition of lockdown we were seeing that some youths were unnecessarily roaming the streets just for fun. As foolish acts of lockdown offenders are creating a risk for others, we decided to form out teams to teach these offenders a lesson,” Kour told The Tribune. She said the focus of their teams was to force such lockdown offenders not to step outside.

“Not only are we enforcing the lockdown, we are also seeking information from womenfolk of this belt about the travel history of some suspicious persons,” she said.

Villagers of the belt are also following social distancing and complete lockdown in the right spirit and have banned the entry of outsiders in the village to prevent people with COVID19 infection.

“Government is playing its role in controlling the spread of virus and lockdown is part of that but as vigilant members of society we have to supplement government’s efforts,” she said.