Mandatory registration for Kumbh-bound Delhi residents, quarantine on return

Devotees taking part in ‘royal baths’ (shahi snan) held at Kumbh on April 12 and 14 were seen flouting all Covid-19 norms and at least 2,000 persons tested Covid-19 positive in about a week’s time.

The Delhi disaster management authority (DDMA) made it mandatory for residents to register on a Delhi government website before visiting the Kumbh Mela in Haridwar and undergo 14-day quarantine upon their return. Experts however said the order, announced late Saturday night, was too little, too late, as Delhi recorded a new daily peak of 24,375 new Covid-19 cases the same day.

Social distancing norms were violated during the third 'Shahi Snan' at the Kumbh Mela in Haridwar on April 14, 2021. (PTI Photo)

A Delhi government official who didn’t wish to be named acknowledged that “such a portal should have been created earlier, preferably before the Kumbh Mela started on March 11 or from April 1, when the cases started rising in Delhi”. The government has no data of the number of residents who went to the Kumbh Mela this year, senior government officials said. Another official pointed out that an earlier advisory RT-PCR tests and self-monitoring of health after return from the Kumbh was not mandatory.

The latest order asks residents who visited Kumbh between April 4 and April 17 to compulsorily upload their contact details within 24 hours by Sunday midnight. These details have to be added through a link provided on the Delhi government website www.delhi.gov.in. Those planning to go to the Kumbh Mela till its closure on April 30 also have to fill up the form on the website.

“...If it is found/reported that any such resident of Delhi, who has returned to Delhi after visiting Kumbh, has not uploaded the requisite details/information, he/she will be sent to an institutional government quarantine centre for 14 days by the district magistrate (DM) concerned,” read the order, which also asks DMs to trace such residents and monitor them daily. Violations will invite action under sections 51 to 60 of the Disaster Management Act, 2005, besides under section 188 of the Indian Penal Code (IPC) and other legal provisions as applicable, the order added.

Devotees taking part in ‘royal baths’ (shahi snan) held at Kumbh on April 12 and 14 were seen flouting all Covid-19 norms and at least 2,000 persons tested Covid-19 positive in about a week’s time, triggering concerns that the Kumbh had turned into a super spreader event. The late night order came on a day when the national capital recorded its highest daily spike of 24,375 Covid-19 cases by far, taking total number of active cases to 69,799. Several states such as Odisha and Madhya Pradesh have also asked returnees to self-isolate and quarantine themselves. Maharashtra, too is considering issuing an advisory in this regard. Earlier in the day, Prime Minister Narendra Modi called for symbolic participation in the last two weeks of the event, including the final Shahi Snan on April 27.

But Dr Lalit Kant, former head of the department of epidemiology at the Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR), said the damage has already been done.

“Weeks have passed since day one of the Maha Kumbh and thousands must have already returned to Delhi. ...Now, people who returned in the past 14 days will have to be traced and tracked and there is no guarantee that everyone who went there will actually fill the forms. All of the returnees are moving freely, some of whom may even have Covid-19,” he said.

A revenue official said it will be next to impossible to identify those who returned from the Kumbh without the pilgrims declaring their details on the government portal.

“There are chances that we can track those Delhi visitors who registered in the Uttarakhand government portal. But, it is unlikely that most of them did that,” he said on condition of anonymity.