Aizawl, May 15 (IANS): The Mizoram government is likely to extend the lockdown till May 31 to check the spread of Covid-19 infection, an official said on Friday.

According to an official of the Health and Family Welfare department, in principle, the state government is keen to extend the lockdown.

"Chief Secretary Lalnunmawia Chuaungo on Friday held a meeting with various stakeholders to finalise the conditions and guidelines of the fourth phase of lockdown beyond May 17," the official who did not want to be identified, told IANS.

He said that the formal announcement about the fourth phase would be made on Saturday or Sunday.

Most political parties and a large number of organisations, including those of NGOs, churches and doctors, during a meeting on Thursday strongly wanted extension of the lockdown.

The Chief Secretary, who is the chairman of the Covid-19 taskforce group, would finalise the modalities of the lockdown.

Chief Minister Zoramthanga, who presided over Thursday's meeting, had said that extension of lockdown was very vital to protect the safety of people although the state has been declared green zone after its lone patient recovered on May 9.

The 50-year-old Christian pastor, who had tested positive for coronavirus on March 24 on his return to Aizawl from Amsterdam, via Delhi and Guwahati on March 16, was discharged from the hospital last week after he recovered from the disease.

Health officials in Aizawl said four people, including two women, from Mizoram tested Covid-19 positive in Maharashtra in the third week of April. All the four, three of them cancer patients, were staying at Mizoram House in Mumbai along with their relatives.

A doctor from Mizoram, who worked at a Meghalaya hospital, also tested coronavirus positive in Shillong on April 14. All these people are now stable.