With a lockdown announced across the country for 21 days, there has been a lot of commotion, as one would expect.

There has been panic buying, crowding, and in a rather disturbing news, harassment of delivery boys.

Samidha Sharma, a Twitter user, shared pictures of beaten up delivery boys, who were on the road merely doing their jobs.

In this connection, delivery site Milk Basket also shared a tweet, telling its customers that it won’t be functioning in cities – Gurugram, Noida and Hyderabad.

They further went on to explain:

On Sunday, we delivered to all our customers before 5:30 AM and Milkbasket vendors were harassed and held by authorities for ‘being on road’.

Until yesterday, e-commerce sites were exempted from section 144 imposed by the government. However, the PM’s address made things a bit confusing for these companies. Speaking about the same, Albinder Dhindsa, CEO of Grofers told Economic Times:

There was some confusion on the ground as the message from central government was not clear to local authorities as to what needed to be allowed. Better communication (is needed) to let services like Grofers, BigBasket or 1mg be allowed to operate will help make sure the flow of essential items to a self-quarantined India doesn’t stop.

There were also claims that even security guards coming for their duty were beaten up by the police, but the same could not be verified. 

The situation is tense and a challenge even for the government. However, there should be clear message from the center to the state authorities so that people, who are helping the society to function in these dark times do not suffer.