Bangladesh prime minister Sheikh Hasina on Thursday asked Muslims to celebrate the upcoming Eid-ul Fitr in their present locations to help check the spread of coronavirus across the country.

‘We all shouldn’t travel risking our lives on the occasion of Eid. Celebrate Eid where you’re now,’ she said.

The Prime Minister said this while inaugurating a good number of infrastructures and water vessels of different agencies under the Shipping Ministry through a videoconference from her official residence Ganobhaban.

Sheikh Hasina said people can meet their near and dear ones later when the situation will get normal.

‘In order to stop the spread of coronavirus throughout the country, I would like to request you all to abide by health protection rules and not to travel from one place to another unless there’s an urgent matter,’ she said.

The prime minister said no one knows who is carrying the virus during their journeys. ‘When an infected person travels to another place, he may make many more infected and thus cause problems to their lives. This is why the government has taken steps to limit the movement of people,’ she said.

The infrastructures and water vessels that the PM inaugurated include TS Ilia Ahmed Chowdhury Dada Bhai Training Ship, 20 cutter suction dredgers, 83 dredger-auxiliary vessels, newly-constructed dredger base in Narayanganj, special inspection vessel ‘Paridarshi,’ two passenger vessels ‘MV Tajuddin Ahmad’ and ‘MV Ivy Rahman’, and four marine academies in Pabna, Barishal, Rangpur and Sylhet.

Besides, the prime minister inaugurated the distribution of 500 pucca houses, constructed under a rehabilitation project in Paira Port, among the families affected by land acquisition.