New Delhi, May 8 (IANS): Gearing up for housing all those landing at Delhi's Indira Gandhi International (IGI) airport as part of the Vande Bharat mission, close to 60 hotels in Karol Bagh have been asked to isolate over 1,200 rooms for setting up paid quarantine facilities.
In two separate orders, Nidhi Srivastava, District Magistrate (Central), has asked the management of these hotels to isolate the rooms and place them at the discretion of the Revenue Department, Central District, for setting up paid quarantine facilities.
"The hotels were also asked to provide the manpower and other resources as are essentially required to fully operationalise the requisite accommodations as institutional paid quarantine facilities with immediate effect," the DM said.
It also warned that non-compliance of the order "shall attract penal action as per the Acts or Regulations in force".
All the hotels have been asked to isolate a particular number of rooms by the administration, ranging between 15 and 30. The maximum number of rooms for any hotel is 35.
The hotels include Hotel Sopan Heights (15 rooms), Hotel Royal Holidays (15 rooms), Hotel Pooja Palace (22 rooms), Hotel C Park (24rooms) and Hotel Kyron (23 rooms).
While the Royal Residency has been asked to isolate 25 rooms, for Hotel Silver Arc the number of rooms is 21.
Hotel Park View has been asked to isolate minimum -- 10 rooms -- while Hotel Grand Imperial will isolate 35 rooms, maximum among all the hotels.
The ratings of the 59 hotels vary, ranging from two-star to five-star.
On Wednesday, the city government said that all the passengers coming from abroad will be screened and those without any risk factor will be sent for home quarantine for 14 days after handing them their passports.
It also said that those from other states can be looked after by the resident commissioners and nodal officers of their respective states, including arrangements for their boarding and lodging in Delhi and transportation to their respective states.
However, it revised the order on Thursday, saying everyone will have to mandatorily go under institutional quarantine in a paid facility for 14 days from the date of their arrival, irrespective of their health condition or the state they belong to.
More than 400 passengers are expected to land in Delhi on Friday.
Speaking to IANS, an official said that about 1,200 rooms have been arranged by the government, including those in luxury hotels -- Le Meridian, Sheraton, Vivanta, Red Fox and IBIS, among others.