A 24-year-old man from Assam, who had fled from a coronavirus quarantine facility in Kerala along with two others from Odisha and West Bengal, was nabbed by authorities in Guwahati early on Thursday.
Shariful Islam, a resident of Morigaon district, was kept in isolation for showing symptoms of Covid-19 disease and had fled from quarantine in a hotel in Kozhikode on March 16.
“Based on the information provided by the police in Morigaon, Railway Protection Force (RPF) and our officials were able to trace him and arrest him from the Kanchanjunga Express at New Bongaigaon around 12:30am,” Subhanan Chanda, chief spokesperson of the Northeast Frontier Railways (NFR), said.
Islam has been taken into custody and kept in isolation at the railway hospital in Bongaigaon, 180km west of Guwahati. Adequate security measures are in place to ensure that he doesn’t flee again.
He has not yet been found positive for Covid-19.
Islam confessed to having fled the quarantine facility during questioning. He said he took a train from Parak in Kerala to Chennai and from there boarded another train to Howrah.
He boarded the Kanchanjunga Express at Howrah with the intention of going back to Morigaon.
Following the incident, railway authorities conducted screening of all passengers of the coach in which Islam was travelling before allowing the train to leave Bongaigaon station.
A doctor couple posted at Fakhruddin Ali Ahmed Medical College and Hospital in Barpeta, who returned from a trip to Saudi Arabia last week, has been kept in home isolation for two weeks.
The couple had not informed the authorities about their visit. The husband had joined duty after return and even conducted an operation in the government hospital located 95km away from Guwahati.
Assam has not reported any positive case of coronavirus so far. India is currently grappling with stage 2 of the coronavirus outbreak, with 173 cases including four deaths and people discharged as on Friday morning.
