Pilgrims had no symptoms when they were in Nanded, say Maharashtra officials

Mumbai: The Punjab and Maharashtra governments accused each other of spreading the Covid-19 infection in their states, trading blame over the visit of Sikh pilgrims to Nanded which is in the orange zone but is in danger of turning into a red zone as there are 31 confirmed cases in the district. More than 3,500 Sikh pilgrims were stranded in Nanded for over 40 days before they were finally sent to Punjab late last month. More than 200 of them have been found positive. The Punjab government blamed Maharashtra for the pilgrims being infected in Maharashtra while the latter blamed Punjab for bringing the infection in Nanded, where the pilgrims were staying.

The pilgrims were staying at the Hazur Sahib gurdwara. Maharashtra government officials said the pilgrims could not have been infected in the state as the people did not show any symptoms when they were in Nanded. “We have been screening them. However, none of them showed any symptoms. More than 1,000 of them were senior citizens; there were even cancer patients among them. It cannot happen that they were infected and none of them showed any symptoms,” an official from Nanded said on condition of anonymity.

Maharashtra’s public works department minister Ashok Chavan, who represents Nanded, issued a video message saying the district was in danger of turning into a red zone and that the Punjab government sending in 178 buses that travelled through “hotspots in Rajasthan and Madhya Pradesh” might have led to the infection coming into Nanded. “If the pilgrims in the gurdwara were already infected when they were here then the coronavirus would have spread all over the city in Nanded. Till now the sevadars (volunteers) who served food to the drivers and the other staff in the bus that came from Punjab have only been infected,” said Chavan. “I can say that whatever has happened is definitely due to the people who have come all the way from Punjab. They stayed in the gurdwara and that has caused the virus.”

The Punjab government’s media adviser, Raveen Thukral, did not respond to ET’s queries on the matter. A private doctor in Nanded, however, said: “It is possible that these pilgrims might have been infected in the last few days that they stayed in Nanded and if that is the case then we might start seeing infections from within Nanded also.” He said if Nanded does not get more cases from within the district then the infection might have come from Punjab.