The Hailakandi district administration in Assam has declared Barjurai village under Hailakandi revenue circle as “containment zone” to arrest further spread of novel coronavirus after a 65-year-old villager tested positive on Tuesday night.
The patient, who had visited the religious congregation at Nizamuddin in New Delhi last month, is the third positive case in Barak Valley and the 28th in the state.
No positive case was reported in the state on Wednesday but the government started sanitising the places where Tripura’s first positive patient had visited or stayed, including Kamakhya temple, in Guwahati and tracing and sending to quarantine the people she had come into contact with.
Hailakandi deputy commissioner Keerthi Jalli sealed Barjurai village around 11.45pm on Tuesday under the Assam Covid-19 Containment Regulation, 2020, with strict perimeter and demarcating entry and exit points.
“The containment measures will shut down everything barring essential services,” the order said. It prohibits mass gatherings in containment and buffer zones till the area is declared free from the virus. Vehicles and persons engaged in essential services entering and exiting the containment zone are being sanitised. The order urged people in the containment zone to ensure social distancing during social mobilisation.
Jalli asked superintendent of police Pabindra Kumar Nath to mobilise community policing and activate village defence parties in the containment zone, prevent rumours and stigmatisation and deploy security personnel to enforce containment protocols.
Sources said the patient, a retired grade IV employee of Lakshirbond Senior Madrasa, had travelled to Saudi Arabia for Haj.
From Mecca he came to Mumbai and then went to Delhi where he attended the religious congregation at Nizamuddin. From Delhi, he returned to Badarpur in Hailakandi by train on March 18 after which he was in home isolation.
Joint director of health services, Hailakandi, R.C. Dwivedy, said the person’s swab sample was sent to Silchar Medical College and Hospital on April 5. Around 9pm on Tuesday, the hospital said the person had tested positive for Covid-19 after which he was shifted to the hospital that night.
The health authorities are collecting swab samples of his family members — wife, son and daughter — and tracing the persons he came into contact with.
Chief minister Sarbananda Sonowal on Wednesday reviewed the Covid-19 situation in Cachar, Karimganj and Hailakandi districts of Barak Valley with senior district administration officials, heads of departments, MPs and MLAs in Hailakandi.
He asked everyone to work unitedly and resolutely in the fight against Covid-19.
He asked the administration to ensure uninterrupted flow of essential commodities and power supply during the lockdown and take stern action against those posting objectionable texts on social media that can flare up communal tension and create stumbling block in the fight against Covid-19.
Earlier, Sonowal inspected the isolation ward of S.K. Roy civil hospital and interacted with the doctors and nurses.
The doctors of Mahendra Mohan Choudhury Hospital and Sonapur civil hospital in Guwahati, who had treated Covid-19 patients for a week, were given a warm sendoff on Wednesday for their mandatory 14-day quarantine at Taj Vivanta. The Assam government has made a rule that after treating Covid-19 patients for seven days, a doctor will have to go for 14-day quarantine.
Assam police said 1,108 incidents of lockdown violation were reported and 578 cases registered, 1,258 persons were arrested in this connection, 5,871 vehicles, 12 country boats and five mechanised boats were seized and fines totalling Rs 21.73 lakh realised in the state till Wednesday.
The state government has tested 2,351 samples so far, 28 positive cases have been found in Assam — nine in Golaghat, four each in Nalbari and Morigaon, three in Goalpara and one each in Hailakandi, Dhubri, Kamrup (metro), Cachar, North Lakhimpur, Kamrup, South Salmara and Karimganj.
Besides 28 in Assam, five positive cases have been found in the Northeast — two in Manipur and one each in Mizoram, Arunachal Pradesh and Tripura.
The Centre on Wednesday said donation made to Assam Arogya Nidhi Trust would be exempted from tax.
Additional reporting by a staff reporter in Guwahati