GTA officials led by its head Anit Thapa stood in a line before a quarantine centre in Kalimpong on Tuesday and clapped to welcome five people who were discharged after being tested negative for the novel coronavirus.

A report from the Viral Research and Diagnostic Laboratory at the North Bengal Medical College and Hospital in Siliguri said nine people from Kalimpong had tested negative for the virus. Of the nine, five were housed at the quarantine centre. The rest were in self-quarantine.

As the GTA group and Kalimpong municipality chairman Rabi Pradhan clapped to welcome the five, an emotional Ajay Kumar Singh, 35, said their morale was being boosted by the gesture. “We are thankful to all, honourable chief minister, Anit Thapa, the media, municipality people, doctors and nurses who are at the ground zero. You boosted our confidence today,” said Singh.

At a time many suspected Covid-19 patients have been ostracised, the gesture by Thapa seems to have come as a welcome relief.

Singh belonged to the family which reported the first Covid-19 death in north Bengal last month. Since then, most of the family members had been in quarantine and later tested negative.

Thapa said: “It feels good and I guess everyone is feeling good. There is a feeling of satisfaction after having worked hard. Our entire team is energised (by the positive development).”

The GTA chief has stationed himself in Kalimpong soon after the first case was detected in the town.

“There was a lot of fear when I first came to Kalimpong. I decided to come here to boost the morale of the people, which was the only way out in the absence of any medicine to cure the disease,” said Thapa.

Even though there was a sigh of relief not just in Kalimpong but across the Darjeeling hills on Tuesday after relatives of the deceased Covid-19 patient had tested negative, both Thapa and Singh cautioned people against taking things easy.

“People should not think that they can do whatever they feel like now that we are getting some good results,” said Thapa.

Before the discharge of the five on Tuesday, there had been 46 people in quarantine at Disha Centre and Marwari Bhavan in Kalimpong and another 14 in quarantine at Fagu in Gorubathan block.

A total of 181 people are in self quarantine in Kalimpong district while the figure is 119 in Darjeeling district.

Two people from Kalimpong district are at the isolation centre in Dr Chhang’s Super Specialty Hospital in Siliguri.