A 24-year-old passenger, who allegedly jumped quarantine in Kerala, was tracked down by the Railway Protection Force to New Bongaigaon railway station in lower Assam on Thursday morning and sent to the isolation ward of Bongaigon railway hospital.

The youth, a resident of Morigaon district in central Assam, was travelling in the general coach of 13175 Up Kanchanjunga Express.

The other passengers in the coach, around 50 of them, were medically screened by doctors before the train left. All of them were advised to quarantine themselves at home for at least two weeks, according to the norms, even if they are asymptomatic (having no symptoms of the disease) to contain community transmission of coronavirus. If symptoms develop, they will need to get checked.

However, a GRP officer at the New Bongaigaon railway station said the medical team did not conduct thermal screening of the youth’s co-passengers in the crowded general coach of the train.

Officially, there has been no confirmed case of Covid-19 in Assam till date.

An NFR statement said they got information from Morigaon police that a person had allegedly jumped quarantine after coming into contact with infected people in Kerala.

A joint team of Government Railway Police (GRP) and Railway Protection Force detrained the youth at 12.55am at platform No. 3 at New Bongaigaon railway station after tracking his location through his cell phone, New Bongaigaon station GRP inspector Biswajit Rabha said.

NF Railway chief public relations officer Subhanan Chanda said, “On interrogation, he said he had fled from a quarantine centre in Kerala and travelled by train from Parak to Chennai and from Chennai to Howrah by Howrah Mail. At Sealdah in Calcutta, the person boarded the 13175 Up Sealdah-Silchar Kanchanjunga Express via Guwahati. He was supposed to get down at Guwahati station from where he would have proceeded to Morigaon. He was immediately detrained.”

Doctors screened the youth and shifted him to the railway hospital in New Bongaigaon in keeping with protocol. He is being kept in the isolation ward of the hospital for further medical observation. “His sample has been sent to Gauhati Medical College and Hospital,” Chanda said.

However, the chief medical officer of Bongaigaon district health department, Dr Bhupen Baishya, said the youth had denied being placed in quarantine in Kerala and bore no symptoms of Covid-19.

Bongaigaon deputy commissioner M.S. Lakshmi Priya visited the station and urged the passengers not to panic.

Altogether 24 trains have been cancelled by NF Railway.

Cloud on weddings

The Tripura government has restricted the registration of Hindu marriages and exempted biometric attendance in its offices to prevent the spread of coronavirus in the state.

A memorandum issued by the office of the West district registrar said the registration of deeds and marriages (Hindu) in the offices of the sub-registrar in the district and its sub-divisions, including Sadar, Mohanpur and Jirania, has been restricted to urgent matters between March 18 and 29 to avoid public gathering to contain coronavirus. The urgency will be judged by the officer concerned, it added. The restriction has also been imposed in all jails across the state.

“No visitors should not be allowed to meet jail inmates till March 31 and all newly admitted undertrial and convicted prisoners should undergo a thorough medical check-up. In case a prisoner is found to have high temperature, he/she should be kept in isolation ward,”a report said.

Additional reporting by Tanmoy Chakraborty in Agartala

“Any prisoner found to have symptoms of coronavirus should be hospitalised immediately in the local hospital,” the report from a nodal officer of prison directors said on Wednesday night.

Another notification, signed by M. Rema, under-secretary of the state government, said all possible preventive measures should be taken to stop the spread of the virus.

“It is learnt that the most common method of transmission of virus seems to be through the infected surface. Therefore, it is desirable to avoid touching the surface which might be infected due to human touch. All the offices of the government of Tripura, where biometric attendance systems are continuing, are requested to take urgent necessary steps to exempt their employees from marking biometric attendance in Aadhaar-based biometric attendance system till April 15, 2020. However, all the employees are required to mark their attendance in attendance register during this period,” it added.

The chairman of district health and family welfare society, Dr Nirmal Saha, refuted reports being circulated on social media that one Covid-19 positive case had been found in Khowai district. He said they had sent a medical team to the locality but found no such case admitted in the district in the past two weeks.

Sports meets put off

The Assam government on Thursday directed Assam Olympic Association not to allow any sports meet, coaching camps or selection trials till April 15 in view of the coronavirus threat.

It has, however, exempted Olympic preparations, following all quarantine protocols.