New Delhi: Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Tuesday announced an extension of the current nationwide lockdown till May 3, saying social distancing is the only way to prevent the coronavirus pandemic from spreading. 

He also said the shutdown will be enforced more strictly and all states will be evaluated on their performance in containing the outbreak. If any state or its any district is found satisfactory, certain areas may be given conditional reprieve from April 20, said Modi.

Modi stressed that the focus should be not to allow creation of any new hotspots.

"India started screening at airports even before we had one corona positive patient in the country. Even though we had 550 cases, India took a big decision to completely shutdown India. We didn't wait for the problem to erupt," stressed Modi.

Making a comparison internationally, the PM said that India is in a far better position than other nations who are battling with thousands of corona positive cases.

As of Tuesday, India has 8,988 active corona cases and 339 deaths.