Delhi night curfew: Authorities gets over 73,000 applications for e-passes

Soon after the night curfew was enforced in Delhi on Tuesday, authorities across districts received over 73,000 applications for e-passes, of which only 1,271 were approved, officials said.

More than 34,000 applications were rejected as the applicants did not fall in the exempted categories according to the Delhi Disaster Management Authority (DDMA) order, the officials said on Wednesday.

The Delhi government on Tuesday imposed seven hours of night curfew, from 10 PM to 5 AM, with immediate effect for this entire month as an emergency measure for the "wellbeing and safety" of people in view of rising COVID-19 cases in the city.

People will require a soft or hard copy of the e-pass to travel during curfew hours. The e-pass can be obtained from the Delhi government website -- www.delhi.gov.in.

After the imposition of the night curfew on Tuesday, a total of 73,154 applications were received for e-passes. Of these, 34,759 were rejected and 30,940 were pending by Wednesday noon, official figures showed.

Only 1,271 applications were approved across all 11 districts.

"Most of the applications were rejected as the applicants did not fall in the exempted categories as per Delhi Disaster Management Authority order," the officials said.

The highest number of applications were received in New Delhi district at 13,139, followed by 11,661 in South West, 9,947 in South, 7,673 in West, 6,560 in North West, and 6,065 in East Delhi, the official data showed.

New Delhi district also saw the highest number of rejected applications at 6,074, followed by 5,603 in East, 5,580 in West, 4,637 in South and 3,431 in West Delhi.

A total of 6,132 applications were accepted and verification was pending for 51 others.

The highest pendency of applications was seen in New Delhi at 6,525. As many as 5,093 applications were pending in South and 4,102 each in North West and South West.

In Shahdara district, 1,110 applications were received and 1,105 were pending, the data showed.

East Delhi district, which received 6,065 applications, had the lowest pendency at 42.

Several categories of people, including those going for COVID-19 vaccination, persons associated with essential services, pregnant women, central and Delhi government officials involved in emergency services, etc. are exempted from the night curfew.