The government has allowed reopening of shops and shopping malls for five days from Friday (April 9-13) subject to maintaining health guidelines.
The Cabinet Division issued a circular in this regard on Thursday.
As per the circular, owners will be allowed to keep their shops and shopping malls open from 9 am to 3 pm in compliance with the health guidelines.
It said legal action will be taken if health protocols are not maintained properly.
Shops and shopping malls in the country remained shut since April 5 due to a weeklong lockdown enforced by the government to fight the second wave of Covid-19.
Meanwhile, shop owners and employees of New Market and adjacent shopping malls have been staging demonstrations since Monday protesting the closure of shopping malls during the lockdown.
Owners and employees of shops of Dhaka New Super Market, Chandrima Super Market, Nur Mansion and several other shopping malls demanded the government allow the market owners keep those open for four hours every day during the shutdown.
The main objective of the lockdown is to control unnecessary public movements and gatherings with stronger monitoring by members of law enforcement agencies and thus contain the virus transmission.
It is the first official lockdown in Bangladesh to tackle the deadly coronavirus.
As the country has been experiencing record-breaking Covid cases for the past few days, the government on Sunday announced to impose a weeklong countrywide lockdown.
