Nearly 3,500 Keralites returned home through the six designated State border check-posts by late evening on Wednesday.

Walayar accounted for the highest number of returnees with 2,262 people crossing the border, followed by Manjeswaram (786), Muthanga (393), Inchivila (326), Kumily (251), and Aryankavu (232).

Of those who came through Walayar, more than four-fifths were men. Most of them reached here from Karnataka and Tamil Nadu.

On Tuesday, as many as 2,920 people had returned via Walayar. Among them were 2,111 men, 559 women and 250 children. The return process of Keralites trapped in other States continued through the night.

3 test negative

Meanwhile, the results of COVID-19 tests conducted on three students who reached here from Salem via the Walayar check-post were found negative on Wednesday. They had reached here on Monday night and were shifted to a COVID-19 care centre when they showed symptoms. Health officials said none who reached here from other States on Wednesday were either tested or shifted to hospital. They said none showed any symptoms. One person had been shifted to hospital after he suffered a heart attack on Tuesday.

Of the 326 who entered the State through the interstate border check-post at Inchivila in Thiruvananthapuram district on Wednesday, 149 were women. None of them displayed COVID-19 symptoms, the district administration said. Eighty-four of the returnees whose travel originated in designated red zones in Tamil Nadu were shifted to the surveillance centre at Mar Ivanios College in the city.

(With inputs from Kollam, Idukki, Palakkad, Wayanad, and Kasaragod Bureaus)