Nagaland: Air of uncertainty as stranded citizens arrive

Special train from Chennai carrying almost 1500 Nagaland citizens reach a temporarily locked down Dimapur

Our Reporter/Correspondent
Dimapur, May 22 (EMN): After enduring a delay that stretched for almost six hours, the special train from Chennai, in Tamil Nadu, ferrying stranded Nagaland citizens arrived at Dimapur railway station at around 6.20 pm on Friday.

A reliable source from the Empowered Committee that monitors Covid-19 activities in Dimapur informed that there were 1469 citizens of Nagaland aboard the Shramik Special Train.

However, Home Commissioner Abhijit Sinha, in his daily Covid-19 briefing, stated that there were “1320 stranded persons of Nagaland” aboard the train.

Preparations for arrival of the stranded passengers from Chennai began as early as 10 am on Friday, as yellow and green buses were seen lined up at Dimapur railway station to ferry the passengers to their respective quarantine centres.

The district administration and commissioner of police, had on May 21, ordered a lockdown from 12 noon to facilitate their movement on arrival.

On Friday morning, police officers at the railway station were seen giving instructions to the police personnel on duty; and the medical officials were directing the bus and ambulance drivers on how to go about their duty.

The special Shramik train for Nagaland from Chennai carrying stranded citizens of the north-eastern states reached Dimapur at around 6.20 pm on May 22, after a delay of almost six hours.

The bureaucrat in charge of Covid-19 related activities in Dimapur, Y Kikheto Sema, along with Deputy Commissioner Anoop Khinchi, Chief Medical Officer (CMO) Tiasunep Pongener and government officials welcomed the returnees.

A pastor prayed from the platform before the passengers got down from the train.

The returnees de-boarded the train phase-wise, and six counters were arranged for screening and collecting details of the passengers in order to segregate them to Dimapur and Kohima centres. Two doctors, six nurses and 10 support staff were available at the station.

One-way passage was made for the passengers to come out of the station, which were barricaded with ropes. The passage led them directly to the disinfection booths from where they were sent directly to the bus.

The returnees’ luggage were sanitised at the disinfection booths, which was inaugurated earlier in the day.

Returnees to Dimapur, Peren, and Mon district were taken to the Agri Expo site in Dimapur. The remaining passengers were sent to Kohima.

According to a notification issued by the CMO, Dimapur, the passengers at Agri Expo would be segregated according to the coach number of the symptomatic person.

“All passengers in coach No. 9 and 12 and in any other coach having symptoms identified are to be segregated separately from each other and also from other coaches during reception, screening, fooding (sic), transportation and allotment of quarantine centres,” it stated.

More than 3000 persons returned

A total of 3277 returnees have arrived in Nagaland till date, according to an update received from the control room of Empowered Committee in Dimapur on Friday evening.

Meanwhile, 1542 stranded people arrived on Friday night.

When contacted, sources from the Empowered Committee informed Eastern Mirror that 1469 returnees arrived from Chennai via Shramik special train at Dimapur railway station on Friday.

According to the updates, 569 returnees from Dimapur district were onboard the special train; Peren – 359; Tuensang – 166; Mon – 147; Kohima – 72; Kiphire – 40; Phek – 39; Wokha – 35; Mokokchung – 22; Zunheboto – 14, and Longleng – 6.

Meanwhile, another train from New Delhi ferried 17 persons to Dimapur railway station on Friday evening.

A bus from Mizoram with 18 stranded people, and another from Assam with 24 passengers, also reached Dimapur on the same day.

Two private vehicles carrying six stranded people from Manipur and another one from Assam ferrying two persons also arrived Dimapur on Friday.

On the same day, another private vehicle from Kolkata transported four persons while a taxi from Assam dropped off two persons respectively in Kohima.

On Thursday, 1735 returnees were confirmed to have arrived in the state.

On Sunday (May 24), at least 426 stranded citizens of Nagaland are expected to arrive in Dimapur via train from Gurugram in Haryana. The train is expected reach around 5.40 am.