E-Paper
Wrong to blame expatriates for rising Covid-19 numbers, says Kerala CM
Vijayan’s comment came in the wake of a campaign in social media alleging the government was very harsh towards NRIs after positive cases of Covid-19 went up.
Kerala Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan on Wednesday said it was wrong to blame expatriates and people who came from other states for the spurt in Covid-19 cases but conceded that the rising numbers pose a fresh challenge to the state.
“Some people are giving a different interpretation to the tough procedure being adopted by the government. We are only trying to identify the source to equip ourselves to combat the disease. They have every right to come back to their state. Due to the peculiar situation some restrictions are there,” he said.
Vijayan’s comment came in the wake of a campaign in social media alleging the government was very harsh towards NRIs after positive cases of Covid-19 went up.
“The state’s progress is because of the contributions of the expatriates. We really salute our brethren. Some people are trying to create an ill-feeling and we hope expatriates will realise this,” he said adding the whole state must unite to combat the virus and it was not the responsibility of health workers alone. In view of rising cases the government will have to strengthen its surveillance in coming days, he said.
The state reported 24 new Covid-19 cases on Wednesday out of which 12 had returned from Persian Gulf countries, 11 came from other states and one contracted the disease from an infected person, he said.
The recovery of five persons turned out to be a big relief for the state which has been witnessing a spurt in cases with more than 150 cases surfacing the last eight days. Kerala’s tally now stands at 666 out of 161 are active while the rest have been discharged from hospitals.
The CM said some people who are in home quarantine are interacting with other family members and it poses a serious threat. “Home quarantine means room quarantine. Only one person in the family is allowed to interact with the person in quarantine, that too after keeping distance and other norms. But we came to know some are not following this,” he said adding they are endangering the lives of their family members.
After much confusion, Vijayan said the state government will conduct remaining examinations of Class X (SSLC) and Plus Two from May 26 to May 30 and all arrangements were made for this. Three pending examinations of the SSLC will be conducted from May 26-28. The lockdown came while the examinations were on and later three of them were postponed indefinitely. At least 4.2 lakh candidates will appear for these examinations.
