KARACHI: Sindh Education Minister Saeed Ghani on Monday demanded from the federal government to ban air, road and rail transportation from Punjab and Khyber Pakhtunkhwa as coronavirus cases continued to rise sharply.

Saeed Ghani said that the provincial government would not be able to curb the flourishing of new coronavirus cases if a ban was not imposed on travel from Punjab and KP. He said the new variant of COVID-19 was found in abundance in the other provinces in comparison to Sindh.

“So far situation is not as bad in Sindh, but it can grow worse if it is not controlled. If people continued to travel then the new COVID variant will increase,” he said.

COVID positivity ratio was increasing in Sindh too the Sindh minister said adding that currently the ratio was 2.1 percent, but if you see in Karachi it was 5.39 percent and in Hyderabad it was 5.58 percent.

To a query, the minister said that the middle classes across the province were closed in a bid to protect children from the viral infection. He also said that pupils would not be promoted this time sans examinations, even though they were late by two to three months.

The education minister, on this occasion, also announced that the government was going to hire 37-38,000 teachers to fulfill the shortage.

A day ago, the National Command and Operation Centre (NCOC) had banned inter-provincial transport for two days a week, on Saturday and Sunday, with effect from April 10 to 25.

In a session held in Islamabad on Sunday, the NCOC decided that goods, freight, medical and other emergency services would be exempted.

The forum decided that Railways would continue to operate seven days a week with 70 percent occupancy. The ban will be reviewed on Apr 20 by the NCOC.