Responding to the “announcement” by the Ministry of Social Justice and Empowerment (MoSJE) seeking public feedback for the draft rules of the Transgender Persons (Protection of Rights) Act, more than  150 members  of the transgender community in a letter to the minister of social justice and empowerment have strongly protested against a very limited time period of 12 days for sending suggestions, that too during lockdown.

An Indian Institute of Management-Ahmedabad (IIM-A) study on the impact of lockdown on the marginalized households has found that that around 74% households reported “not earning regular incomes anymore” and 60% reporting that their current food supply would last “for less than a week”.

India’s premier human rights organization, People’s Union for Civil Liberties (PUCL), in a 3,600 word statement, has demanded that Prime Minister Narendra Modi, in consultation with chief ministers, should immediately consider rolling back of the full lockdown in the wake of the Covid-19 crisis, insisting, if it all, India should “have calibrated, limited lockdown areas.”

The Gurgaon Nagrik Ekta Manch (GNEM), an NGO which claims to be providing an average of 350 ration kits per day since March 27, the third day of the lockdown, and about 25,000 cooked meals every day since April 4, has complained that the Haryana government’s response has “lagged behind the stark reality of distress” due to the Covid-19 crisis.

Construction workers’ civil rights organization, Bandhkam Majur Sangathan (BMS), has strongly objected to the Gujarat government move to transfer Rs 250 crore from the welfare fund meant for construction workers to the chief minister's welfare package meant for the poor. As of today, an amount of Rs 2,900 crore welfare fund, collected as cess from the construction industry, is lying unutilized.

In a unique initiative, an Ahmedabad-based NGO Janvikas-supported Institute of Social Studies and Transformation (IST), in close coordination with the Deputy Commissioner of Police (DCP) Zone 5, Ravi Teja, has begun providing food, through 15 self-run kitchens, to thousands of migrants twice a day in Ahmedabad.

The Gujarat High Court has said it “expects and trusts” that the state would be “vigilant and do its best” to ensure the safety of nearly sugarcane 90,000 workers from Maharashtra, working as sugarcane workers in four South Gujarat districts -- Bharuch, Surat, Valsad and Navsari – as also several lakh inter-state migrants from Bihar, Odisha and West Bengal -- but stranded in South Gujarat following the lockdown announced on March 24 by Prime Minister Narendra Modi.

Three civil rights groups, two of them working in Gujarat, have asked Union minister for labour and employment Santosh Gangwar to ensure that the Government of India should begin using “the unspent fund of the Building and Other Construction Workers’ Welfare (BOCWW) Cess Fund”, amounting to Rs 52,000 crore, as emergency financial package.

A new paper, prepared by a group of scholars of the from Impact and Policy Research Institute ( IMPRI ), New Delhi, has said that while the institutional deliveries have increased in the country, as evidenced by various National Family Health Surveys (NFHS), from 39% in 2005-06 to 79% in 2015-16 to 94.3% in 2018-19, the COVID-19 pandemic and the ensuing lockdown have posed “major concerns” for expectant mothers and parents having children up to five years.

In a lockdown checkup, the Right to Food Campaign (Jharkhand) has found “gaping holes” in the state government’s relief measures during a quick survey of essential facilities in rural areas (ration shops, dal-bhat kendras, anganwadis, among others).

  A top Gujarat-based non-government organization (NGO) has regretted that despite clear directions from the chief executive officer (CEO) of the Niti Aayog, which is a Government of India think tank, and a subsequent letter from the National Disaster Management Authority (NDMA), regarding importance and role of NGOs during the COVID-19 crisis, “there seems to be reluctance on the part of the State of Gujarat to collaborate with NGOs.”

A Gujarat-based unorganized workers’ association has revealed that the state government has still not released Rs 1,000, to be paid cash to the nearly 65 lakh workers who had been working the unorganized sector, even though an announcement for this was made by chief minister Vijay Rupani on March 26, 2020, one day after India-wide lockdown was announced.

The Soho St temple and Govinda's restaurant before the pandemic The International Society for Krishna Consciousness (ISKCON), United Kingdom (UK), has admitted that at least 21 of its devotees were infected because of the spread of the coronavirus amongst the UK devotee community following the March 12 funeral and March 15 memorial of the Bhaktivedanta Manor temple president, in which about 1,000 people participated. Regretting that five of the devotees have passed away, the top Hindu religious in Britain body does not deny more may have been infected.

  Rohit Prajapati collecting sample from a Gujarat river The Supreme Court has asked three top Gujarat-based industries, Alembic Pharmaceuticals Ltd, United Phosphorus Ltd and Unique Chemicals Ltd, to deposit a compensation amount of Rs 10 crore each with the Gujarat Pollution Control Board (GPCB), which should use the money for "restoration and remedial measures" to improve the quality of environment in the industrial area in which the industries have been operating.

Biometric authentication A Gujarat NGO, Centre for Social Justice (CSJ), Ahmedabad, giving specific instances obtained from its grassroots activists from across the state, has told top state officials that, despite government notifications requiring free distribution of foodgrains to people during the current lockdown period, a large number of people, especially daily wagers, are unable to feed themselves.

Well-known Ahmedabad-based NGO Centre for Social Justice (CSJ) in a detailed note has demanded a “more structured” involvement of civil society organizations (CSOs) in order to provide relief to the vulnerable sections of society, which have been adversely affected because of the coronavirus crisis.