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With cases of nearly 100 in the Covid-19 epicenter of the Ganjam district, the Odisha government imposed section 144 of the Code of Criminal Procedure on all quarantine centers in the district on Saturday as reports of violations of the regulations arrived by migrant workers.
Cases in the state touched 294, of which 112 are from Surat, as of Saturday night, with the Ganjam hotspot registering 94 cases, all returned from Surat.
The other critical points of Covid-19 are Jajpur, Bhubaneswar, Balasore, Bhadrak, and Rourkela. In other districts, too, cases of Surat migrants returning home are reported.
Ganjam district collector Vijay Aamrita Kulange said Section 144 has been imposed in all Covid-19 medical camps / institutional quarantine centers where the government has housed migrants.
Kulange said that no one will be allowed to enter within a 100-meter radius of the quarantine centers and directed the Superintendent of Police, Subdivisional Magistrates, Executive Magistrates and inspectors of police stations to closely monitor the centers.
The decision comes after a video of people violating quarantine facility rules went viral.
In a Sergarh block quarantine center, 80 migrant workers from Surat, their relatives were seen delivering food and betel to inmates at the door in violation of social distance rules.
Earlier this week, 128 migrant workers returned by Surat had fled two Covid-19 quarantine centers in the Beguniapada block in the Ganjam district before being captured.
The state government also increased the quarantine period for returnees from 14 to 28 days, as many of the positive cases were found after the 14-day quarantine period.
“Returnees from other states will have to undergo a 21-day institutional quarantine followed by a home quarantine for the next seven days,” said Odisha’s chief spokesman on Covid-19, Subroto Bagchi.
The order came even when two people died in two separate quarantine centers in Ganjam and Sonepur districts.
On Friday afternoon, a 40-year-old man who had returned from Surat and showed symptoms of Covid-19 died before his swab sample could be analyzed; while in Sonepur, a Bengal migrant worker died in the quarantine center on Saturday morning. However, it did not show any symptoms of Covid-19.
Authorities said the Supreme Court’s suspension order on Friday over the Orissa Supreme Court order to suspend migrant workers’ travel without the Covid-19 test in the home state would lead to a massive increase in cases. positive. On Thursday, the Orissa High Court had ordered the state government not to allow migrant workers to board the trains to Odisha without testing them for Covid-19.
More than 46,000 people have returned to Odisha from different states and another five lakh migrants are expected to appear. On Saturday, 5 special trains carrying migrants left for Odisha from Gujarat, Maharashtra and Tamil Nadu. Trains will arrive in Odisha on Sunday.
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