Hundreds from Telangana, AP attended event at Nizamuddin
ANDHRA GOVERNMENT HAS IDENTIFIED 800 PEOPLE WHO ATTENDED THE JAMAAT EVENT. THE TELANGANA GOVT HAS IDENTIFIED 1,030 PEOPLE WHO DID SO
HYDERABAD: Nearly 2,000 followers of the Tablighi Jamaat from Andhra Pradesh and Telangana are estimated to have attended the March 15-17 congregation of the Islamic missionary movement in New Delhi’s Nizamuddin, which has since emerged as a coronavirus (Covid-19) hotspot, raising deep concern among governments of the two states.
Telangana officials said six people from the state, who attended the congregation, had died of Covid-19, and the government was trying to trace the people who they had been in contact with. Andhra Pradesh discovered 11 people who had been infected by the virus after attending the event; three contacts too tested positive.
At least 30 people from each district of the two states attended the congregation, said a statement released by the Andhra Pradesh government on Tuesday. Telangana has 33 districts and Andhra Pradesh 13.
The Andhra government has so far identified around 800 people who attended the Jamaat congregation. The Telangana government has identified 1,030 people who did so.
“Officials are gathering information from the event organisers, police officials, the railway department, and from various other sources and tracking down everyone,” said the statement released by AP chief minister YS Jagan Mohan Reddy ’s office on Tuesday evening.
According to a bulletin issued by Andhra Pradesh government on Tuesday, as many as 17 new cases of Covid-19 had been detected in the state since Monday night. Of these, as many as 14 were connected to the Tablighi Jamaat congregation, 11 of them had attended the event and three are relatives of attendees.
CM Reddy, expressing concern over the development, appealed to the people who attended the congregation and the people they came in contact with to step forward for medical treatment.
In Telangana, health minister Etala Rajender asked all those who returned from the congregation to get themselves tested and remain under quarantine.
Mohammad Irfan, a professor of electronics at the Indian Institute of Information Technology (IIIT), Nuzvid, in Andhra Pradesh’s Krishna district, who attended the Nizamuddin event, said no one exhibited any Covid-19 symptoms at the event. “We returned on March 18. Later, I was put in quarantine at Nellore government hospital along with a few others. So far, none of us has developed any symptoms for Covid-19 and are safe,” he said over phone from quarantine.
According to the official statement, arrangements for the Tablighi Jamaat followers in Telangana and Andhra Pradesh to participate in the congregation were supervised by Ikram Ali, leader of the organisation based in Hyderabad’s Mallepall.
HT couldn’t reach Ikram Ali , whose phone was switched off.
Six people from Telangana who attended the congregation died in hospitals after they were infected by the Coovid-19 virus, a statement from the chief minister’s office on Monday night. On Tuesday, 15 more tested positive.