The Assam government has traced 488 people who reportedly participated in a religious event organised by Tablighi Jamaat at Nizamuddin in New Delhi while the state reported three more Covid-19 positive cases, taking its number of cases to 20 — 16 in the state and four outside.
Assam health minister Himanta Biswa Sarma on Thursday said the Centre had given the state government a list of 456 people who reportedly participated in the event and Dispur got the names of another 276 through helpline number 104. Thus, 732 people were initially believed to have participated in the event. Of these, 226 people were found not to have returned to Assam and/or not participated in the event. “So our target was to find 503 people,” he said. Of the 488 people traced, samples of 361 have been collected and sent for testing. Their results will be available by Friday noon. Sarma said 395 people have been quarantined and many more who had come in contact with these people will be quarantined and tested. “Now we have to trace only 15 people,” he added.
Sarma tweeted on Thursday night: “Family members of attendees of #TablighiJamaat congregation at #NizamuddinMarkaz need to be urgently quarantined. We brought them to Sarusojai Sports Complex and I was personally present to ward off any fear among them. To fight #COVID19 Pandemic important to quarantine them.” Sarusajai is a 1,000-bed centre.
Over a hundred people from the Delhi event have tested positive in the country so far. All the 20 people from Assam who have tested positive had attended the event, Sarma said.
He said tracing the 488 people became possible because of cooperation of villagers. “None of the 488 people identified voluntarily.”
Assam reported its first Covid-19 positive case on Tuesday, 12 by Wednesday evening and three on Wednesday night. While these 16 persons are in the state, four positive cases from the state are in Delhi.
Sarma said the three from Goalpara who were found positive on Wednesday night were Kabiruddin Rahman, 41, Sahjahan Ali Ahmed, 60, and Yusuf Ali, 18. The minister mentioned their names so that the people who have been in contact with them could be alerted. “They have been admitted to Goalpara civil hospital for treatment,” he added.
Sarma inaugurated a new ICU and dialysis block in Gauhati Medical College and Hospital on Thursday. “With this, the total number of ICUs in GMCH has increased to 162 from 75 in a week’s time,” he said.
Another 50 ICUs will be ready in GMCH within 15 days, he added.
Immediately after it was found that several people from the state who attended the Delhi event last month had gone into hiding, Assam police launched one of its biggest manhunt.
It sounded an alert across the state and began searching for those who were avoiding tests. Based on the information received at its control rooms and helpline numbers, they managed to trace many.
However, the police also had to deal with several wrong information passed by civilians. On Thursday, information that a group of seven was hiding in a mosque in Paltan Bazar. turned out to be false.
A senior police official at Panbazar requested the public to cooperate with them and not to give misleading information as it “wastes valuable time of the police”. The Assam police headquarters said at least five per cent of the calls received on helpline numbers were found to be frivolous, thus clogging the helpline.
Chief minister Sarbananda Sonowal informed Prime Minister Narendra Modi during a review meeting, conducted through video conferencing, that state police and paramilitary forces have been deployed to ensure complete compliance of the lockdown and and social distancing norms in the state. He said each minister of the state government had been assigned two districts to guide the administration in their preparedness to check the spread of the virus.
Sonowal also informed Modi about the arrangements made by the state health department, including setting up of quarantine and isolation wards, across the state.
He said over 1,000 prisoners were released on bail bonds from the state’s jails during the last couple of days to maintain social distancing inside prison campuses. Besides, arrangement of wards with quarantine facilities in every jail and medical check-up for all jail inmates has been arranged. Assam has 31 jails. The Guwahati central jail has already prepared three separate wards.
He also highlighted the need for uninterrupted inter-state supply of medical products so that treatment of patients can be handled effectively.
During the day, Sonowal was seen leading a sanitisation programme at Fancy Bazar in the city.