Authorities in India have placed more than 80 districts across the country under stringent lockdown after cases of coronavirus were detected from those areas, as the world’s second-most populous nation stepped up measures to halt the spread of the pandemic.

“State governments will issue orders allowing only essential services to operate in about 75 districts with confirmed COVID-19 cases or casualties,” said a home ministry official in New Delhi on Sunday.

The raft of state shutdowns came during a 14-hour voluntary curfew that Prime Minister Narendra Modi said would test India’s ability to fight the pandemic.

“This is the start of a long fight,” Modi tweeted as the curfew came to an end, during which people came out onto their balconies and stood near open windows to clap, clang metal vessels and ring bells to cheer emergency workers battling the spread of the coronavirus.

On Monday, Modi said many Indians were not taking the lockdown seriously. “Please save yourself, save your family, follow the instructions seriously,” he said on Twitter.

Al Jazeera’s Elizabeth Puranam, reporting from New Delhi, said that pretty much all the major cities around the country are in lockdown along with 75 districts, which make up about 10 percent of the country’s population.

“No one is being allowed to go out unless they work in essential services such as healthcare,” she said.

“All inter-state buses have cancelled, so have metro services around the country.”

The Al Jazeera correspondent said that a large number of migrants are stranded at bus stations in big cities as they are trying to get back to their respective home towns.

Source: Al Jazeera