The government has come out with a comprehensive list of services that will remain functional from April 20, 2020 to avoid confusion among people. Union Minister Ravi Shankar Prasad on April 18 had tweeted that "Here is a list of what will remain open all over India with effect from 20th April 2020. This will NOT be applicable in the containment zones." This comes after a new set of guidelines were announced by MHA after Prime Minister Narendra Modi on April 14 announced an extension of the ongoing lockdown till May 3. 

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Here is the full list of services -

- All health services (including AYUSH) to remain functional

- All agricultural and horticultural activities to remain fully functional

- Operations of the fishing (marine/inland) aquaculture industry to remain functional

- Plantation activities such as tea, coffee, and rubber plantations to remain functional with a maximum of 50 per cent workers

- Animal husbandry activities to remain fully functional

- The financial sector to remain functional

- Social sector to remain functional

- MNREGA works are allowed with strict implementation of social distancing and face mask

- Public utilities to remain functional

- Movement of loading and unloading of goods/cargo (inter and intra) state is allowed

- Online teaching/distance learning to be encouraged

- Supply of essential goods is allowed

- Commercial and Private establishments will be allowed to operate

- Industries/Industrial establishments (both government and private) will be allowed to operate

- Construction activities will be allowed to operate

- Private vehicles for emergency services, including medical and veterinary care and for procuring essential commodities and all personnel traveling to the place of work in exempted categories as per the instructions of State/UT local authority are allowed

- Offices of the government of India and offices of the state and UT governments will remain open

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Smartphones and laptops, which were earlier believed to be a part of these services, have been excluded and will not be sold. Under the first phase of lockdown between March 24 and April 14, the Centre had only allowed delivery of essential goods, including food, pharmaceuticals and medical equipment through e-commerce platforms. The delivery of non-essential items remain prohibited.

"Safety of fellow Indians is of utmost importance to us and therefore we support the government's decision in spirit to limiting eCommerce operations to essentials. However, we believe that the ambit of essential goods should be increased. India is mostly working from home at the moment but many are finding it difficult as they are running low on certain items necessary to effectively operate under lockdown. Laptops, mobile phones, and accessories, computer hardware, webcams, all these things should be allowed to be part of essential goods. If the lockdown continues, lack of proper technical support would hinder the efficiency of employees which in turn would affect a company's operations,” Srinivas Mothey, Senior Vice President, Paytm Mall said.