KALABURAGI: “This quarantine centre has turned into a jail for us,” lamented brothers Md Saleem and Abdul Rasheed, who are spending seven days of institutional quarantine after returning from Mumbai at the Post-Matric Hostel for Boys on the Ring Road in Kalaburagi. Run by the Minorities Welfare Department, this hostel is one of the 13 Covid quarantine centres in Kalaburagi taluk.
When TNIE did a reality check of some of the institutional quarantine centres at Kalaburagi and Chittapur on Wednesday, the Kalaburagi centre did look like an actual jail as compared to the Chittapur unit, which was somewhat better.
The brothers, who hail from MSK Mill Colony of Kalaburagi, said, “We are electricians and were living in Mumbai. As our family members were in Kalaburagi, whom we had not met for several months, we came here on June 6. Our friends had told us that Karnataka had withdrawn institutional quarantine. But when we came in Udyan Express at the Kalaburagi station, the police picked all the passengers and told us that we have to be in quarantine centres for a few days.
Now, officials are telling us that we have to be here for seven days,” they said. “We are not even allowed to sit on the stairs outside the hostel as officials always keep the doors shut. There are four people in each room using a common toilet. What if we get infected by using the common toilet? Who will take the responsibility? Sanitation is also poor and the rooms are swept once in two days,” they complained. In all, 67 people are quarantined here.
The quarantine centre at Adarsha Vidyalaya in Chittapur is little better. The quarantined people are allowed to stroll in the open air within the premises. The three-storeyed building has 29 rooms, but all the rooms don’t have a toilet facility. In all, 307 people have been quarantined here after returning from Maharashtra. An inmate, Chandru, said, “Eight to nine people share each room.
As all the people belong to the same family, we are not facing serious problems.” Official sources said that 87 Institutional quarantine centres with 2,831 inmates are functioning in the district (13 in Kalaburagi taluk, 29 in Aland, eight in Afzalpur, two in Jewargi, five in Yadrami, four in Kamalapur, three in Kalagi, 12 in Sedam, two in Chittapur, five in Chincholi and four in Shahabad). A total of 40,332 people have completed their quarantine, while 37,501 were discharged, officials said.