Karnataka Health Minister K Sudhakar on Wednesday said that economic activity in the state, which is already severely hit because of the coronavirus pandemic, will be further affected if there is a lockdown, reported ANI.

“It’s a tricky situation from administrative point of view as economic activity severely hit in last 10 months, if we again try to close the activity, we’ll go back to square one,” Sudhakar said. Karnataka is among the worst-affected states by Covid-19 in the country along with Maharashtra and Kerala in terms of active cases.

The minister’s statement came after two clusters were discovered in capital Bengaluru. One cluster was reported on February 13 after 42 of the Manjushree College of Nursing in Bengaluru’s RT Nagar tested positive. Bruhat Bengaluru Mahanagara Palike Commissioner N Manjunatha Prasad has ordered the closure of the college.

The second cluster was reported in Bommanahalli area of the city where 103 people were found positive for the coronavirus following a party in an apartment complex. Prasad said earlier in the day that 96 of the 103 infected residents were above the age of 60.

In view of the rising cases, the Karnataka government on Tuesday made it mandatory for people coming from Kerala to produce a negative RT-PCR certificate. Those residing in hostels and colleges would not be allowed to have visitors or relatives without getting permission from the Covid-19 nodal officers, the government said. It also asked authorities to maintain a list of students travelling to and from Kerala.

The government also said that passengers arriving from the United Kingdom, Brazil and South Africa will have to bring a negative RT-PCR certificate.

Karnataka has so far reported 9,46,076 Covid-19 cases and its toll stood at 12,273, according to the Union health ministry. There are 5,879 active cases and 9,27,924 people have recovered from the infection.