25,000 Tablighi workers, their contacts quarantined, India orders 5 lakh testing kits

New Delhi, Apr 06: At least 25,500 local workers of the Tablighi Jamaat and the people who came in contact with them have been quarantined, the Union Government has said.
Five Haryana villages where they visited have been sealed: Punya Salila Srivastava, Joint Secretary, Ministry of Home Affairs said.

During the daily briefing, Joint Secretary in the Health Ministry, Lav Agarwal said that in the last 13 days, Indian Railways transported sugar through 1,340 wagons, salt through 958 wagons and edible oil through 316 wagons/tanks, to different parts of the country, amidst the lockdown.

16.94 lakh metric tonnes of food grains have been transported across India till now. In 13 states, 1.3 lakh metric tonnes of wheat and in 8 states, 1.32 lakh metric tonnes of rice have been allotted, Agarwal also said.

The Indian Council of Medical Research said that an order has been placed for 5 lakh testing kits for COVID-19. The ICMR also said that 2.5 lakh kits will be delivered on April 8-9.

On Sunday,Agarwal explained how the Tablighi linked cases across the 17 cases had led to a sudden spike in the number of cases. He said that India's coronavirus cases had doubled in 4.1 days due to the Tablighi Jamaat cases. Had it not been for the congregation, India's rate of doubling would have been at 7.4 days, he also said.

While the Maulana did not pay heed to the advise, there was also resistance on part of the Tablighi members to vacate the premises at Nizamuddin. This had promoted the Union Home Ministry to send National Security Advisor, Ajit Doval to convince the Jamaat members to vacate the Banglewali Masjid.