Karnataka: 38 trekked 38km near border before entering Belagavi district

BELAGAVI: Fearing that they would be put under quarantine, some 38 people from Karnataka, who had been to Rajasthan’s Ajmer on a pilgrimage before the lockdown was announced, waited near Belagavi for a day and trekked nearly 38km in neighbouring Solapur of Maharashtra before slipping into their home state in the first week of May.
But police caught them soon after they set foot into Karnataka and subjected them to tests. Thirty of them have tested positive for Covid-19, and have since been quarantined. The incident that took place on May 3 was kept a secret by the district administration, which had quarantined the travellers at Morarji Desai Residential School in Nippani taluk until now. The result of the tests came on Sunday.
The group, including 11 children, went to Ajmer before the nation went into lockdown on March 26. Stranded in Rajasthan for more than 45 days, the Belagavi and Bagalkot residents hired a bus on April 30 to reach Karnataka after securing inter-state permits from the district administration in Ajmer. The journey was smooth through Gujarat and Maharashtra until they reached Belagavi district border on May 2.
Sources in the district administration said Karnataka police stopped the bus at Nippani checkpost the same afternoon. With police not ready to yield to their requests of allowing them to enter the state, the entourage was forced to spend the night under a roadside tree.
Since it became clear they could be quarantined on the outskirts of the district, the group on May 3 split into batches of 2-3 people and reached roads that link Solapur and Belagavi where there were no checkposts or police vigil.
A district police officer said, “It appeared they were determined to slip into Karnataka through the border village of Borgaon in Solapur. In their 38km trek to freedom, they walked on mud roads and through farmlands carrying children on their shoulders.”
With the entourage missing from the location near the Nippani checkpost, police alerted the district control room. Belagavi DC SB Bommanahalli informed Nippani police as soon as information was relayed to him. The 38 travellers were soon found walking into Nippani, where they were held back and taken into quarantine.
The 30 people who tested positive have been taken to the Belagavi Institute of Medical Sciences and kept under isolation.