2,856 with travel history remain untraceable Amid scare, Assembly session held in Secretariat building

56 persons under isolation in hospitals, 78K migrant workers under home quarantine

The Covid-19 situation in Odisha, though appears to be under control for now with the total number of infected persons remaining at 3 since March 26, is apprehended to assume serious proportions in the coming days as 2,856 persons with travel history to other states and abroad remain untraceable.

The disturbing fact has come to the fore after state health and family welfare department communicated to the district collectors expressing its concern over the foreign returnees, who are yet to be traced.

According to surveillance team report, out of the total 2,856 persons who have not registered themselves on Covid-19 website of state government included 400 from Bhubaneswar, 450 from Khordha, 650 from Ganjam and 350 were from Cuttack.

Fearing possibility of community spread of Covid-19, state health secretary Nikunja Bihari Dhal has sought cooperation from the collectors of all the 300 districts in tracing the missing persons.

According to state health department, as many as 370 samples were tested by Monday afternoon. Of that, 367 tested negative for Covid-19. As many as 56 persons were under hospital isolation in different hospitals while more than 78,000 migrant workers who returned from high risk Covid-19 states remained under home isolation.

Similarly, 4,269 people

Volunteers feed cattle in Odisha’s Cuttack city on Monday.

with travel history abroad and 4,601 persons with domestic travel history who got themselves registered with the state government’s designated Covid-19 website and 104 helpline telephone number were kept under home

quarantine.

On Monday afternoon, 58 passengers, including driver and helper of a bus, were sent to quarantine by Rourkela district administration here after they returned from a pilgrimage in Uttar Pradesh.

Sources said the passengers, residents of Bolangir and Sonepur districts, had gone on a pilgrimage to Mathura and Vrindavan in Uttar Pradesh before announcement of the lockdown.

After Prime Minister Narendra Modi announced the nationwide lockdown on March 25, the pilgrims got stranded there. Later, the administration there made special transport arrangements for their return to Odisha.

They were returning via Rourkela passing through the Jharkhand border. When they arrived in Rourkela in the morning, the local administration sent them to Ispat General Hospital (IGH) for a primary health checkup. All of them were stated to be fit and had no symptoms for Covid-19.

Amid Covid-19 scare, Odisha Assembly on Monday sat in the Convention Hall of state secretariat instead of the Bidhan Soudha building and passed Appropriation Bill for the year 2020-21.

The second phase of the Budget Session of the Assembly was shifted to the Convention Hall of secretariat building after it was found that a 60-yearold Covid-19 infected man had visited the dispensary in the Assembly premises.

Though the Assembly building was sanitized, Speaker Dr S.N. Patra decided to hold the session in secretariat’s convention hall.

The Appropriation Bill of `1,55, 963 crore was passed just in 30 minutes without debate after commencement of session at 10.30 am. After the bill was passed, the Speaker adjourned the House sine die.

Assembly Speaker Dr Patro applied guillotine to pass the bill and adjourned the House for indefinite period, informed BJD MLA Amar Prasad Satapathy.

The Speaker had asked each party to send at least 30 per cent of their members to avoid the crowd.