The State government on Thursday said the illegal movement of people across interstate borders might have triggered the emergence of new COVID-19 positive cases in Green zone districts such as Idukki.
Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan flagged the smuggling of people across borders in cargo vehicles and illegal travel across districts defying the lockdown as the foremost threats to the State’s epidemic containment strategy, which, he said, entered its third phase.
A mafia emerges
Mr. Vijayan asked law enforcers to commit their resources, including drones, to halt the to and fro movement of people between Kerala and Karnataka and also Tamil Nadu through ill-policed byways, forest trails, illegal crossing points, and rural roads. (State Police Chief Loknath Behera directed District Police Chiefs to use drones to crack down on border crossings through highways and byroads.)
The tightening of lockdown curbs had spawned a mafia that transported people for cash.
They contracted a network of ambulance and container lorry drivers to conceal passengers in the holds of their vehicles to convey them to their respective disembarkation points. Some persons living on properties abutting interstate borders aided the racket.
The Kollam police arrested five persons who tried to enter the State illegally from Tamil Nadu through the Aryankavu check-post. They had attempted to cross over in cargo vehicles. Kollam District Collector Abdul Nassar said the administration would cancel the permit of cargo vehicles which smuggled people. A special squad was formed to monitor the 28 entry and exit points along the interstate border. Moreover, the Collector has prohibited lorry crew from bivouacking at houses or eateries near the border.
Teacher’s trip
Mr. Vijayan ordered an investigation into how a schoolteacher from Thiruvananthapuram could enlist the help of the police and later the Excise Department to travel to Thamarassery in Kozhikode from where she crossed over to Karnataka with her two-year-old boy in an excise vehicle for onward passage to New Delhi.
The Wayanad police said the woman had journeyed to Muthanga unchallenged on the strength of a vehicle pass issued by the Deputy Superintendent of Police, Narcotic Cell, Thiruvananthapuram Rural. She then crossed over to Karnataka allegedly with the help of an inspector attached to the Excise Circle Office, Kalpetta.
Her husband received her at the Madhur check-post on the Karnataka side of the border. District Police Chief, Wayanad, R. Ilanko said the police booked the woman and the excise official for violating lockdown and jeopardising pandemic control.
Mr. Vijayan said the police booked a health service doctor for aiding his wife, a surgeon at the Tamil Nadu Medical College Hospital, Kanyakumari, cross the border with Kerala at Tamil Nadu almost daily. The authorities quarantined the couple and booked them under various provisions of the law.
Drivers’ declaration
The Palakkad district authorities tightened the vigil against people sneaking in and out by violating the lockdown restrictions. District Collector D. Balamurali said that apart from the police, GST intelligence officials too started surveillance at the borders. The authorities have made it mandatory for truck and lorry owners to provide self declarations stating the names of drivers and helpers. The new move came into effect when people started travelling in lorries in the guise of helpers.
