With five of the 126 people arrested in connection with Sunday night’s violent protests at Padarayanapura testing positive for COVID-19 in Ramanagaram District Prison, a total of 62 police and prison officials have turned primary contacts and will have to be quarantined.
All staffers at the district prison — 30 of them — will be quarantined based on the advice of the District Health Officer (DHO), said Alok Mohan, Director-General of Police (Prisons).
Family members of the prison staffers vented their anger against the authorities with H.D. Kumaraswamy, the former Chief Minister, who visited prison on Friday. “The staffers were not given any protective gear. They were only given masks and forced to interact with the inmates brought from a COVID-19 affected area in Bengaluru,” they complained. Meanwhile, they also demanded that the staffers have to be quarantined at the staff quarters itself, to which Mr. Kumaraswamy was non-committal. “The modalities of the quarantine process will be decided by the DHO,” said Mr. Mohan.
Police officials in the city are also a worried lot. Personnel from J.J. Nagar Police Station and sleuths from the Central Crime Branch, arrested the riot accused who have now tested positive, interrogated them, took them for medical check-up and escorted them to the prison, and all of the have now turned contacts.
“Anyone who has come into contact with the positive patient for at least 15 minutes has been categorised as a primary contact,” said a senior police official. There are 32 of them and they are being quarantined. They are presently staying at a police facility, away from their families and will be quarantined by Saturday morning, sources said. “The staff members are a bit worried and naturally are scared as well. But we are trying our best to maintain the morale of the force high,” said Shivaji Rao, inspector, J.J. Nagar, who has not been categorised as a primary contact.
Meanwhile, Home Minister Basavaraj Bommai, city Police Commissioner Bhaskar Rao, Additional Commissioner of Police Soumendu Mukherjee, DCP (West) Ramesh Banoth, and a host of other senior functionaries visited Padarayanapura and J.J. Nagar Police station on Sunday night when the violence broke out and the next morning, when some of those who have now tested positive were at the police station.
Deliberations are on with medical authorities whether they would become secondary contacts and what precautions they need to take, sources said.
