The Centre on Tuesday told the Supreme Court that it had left it to asymptomatic incoming passengers to make use of a helpline and inform officials if they developed symptoms of Covid-19.

During the hearing on two PILs, solicitor-general Tushar Mehta, appearing for the Centre, listed before a bench of Chief Justice S.A. Bobde and L. Nageswara Rao the “pre-emptive and proactive steps” the government had taken from January 17 to fight the virus.

“We started thermal screening of persons returning from other countries much before any case detected in India… steps were taken like thermal screening, sanitising, disinfecting. Most other countries started thermal screening later. There is less spread in our country than other countries,” he told the bench.

Mehta said those found with any symptoms after arriving at airports or sea ports were quarantined. Those who didn't have symptoms were advised to home quarantine for 14 days.

Chief Justice Bobde asked: “Did you track those people who did not have symptoms or did you let them go?”

Mehta replied: “We gave them the helpline number and asked them to contact us, if they developed any symptoms. This is a new disease. Nobody in the world had the facilities to deal with it. When the virus was detected as a threat to mankind, we only had one lab in Pune.”

The government has now set up 118 labs across the country with a total capacity to test 15,000 persons a day.