The man, a second engineer in merchant navy, had returned from USA with his wife on May 22.
Continued surveillance, breach of privacy, missed employment opportunity, mental trauma, discrimination, and cluelessness about what happens next are only some issues that the 39-year-old seafarer and his wife have faced in the past week, after the seafarer tested positive for Covid-19, which was declared as a false result later.
However, the struggle with authoritites continues, as policemen visit their home, district authorities keep a track of their movement and the Aarogya setu app continues to show him positive.
The man, a second engineer in merchant navy, had returned from USA with his wife on May 22. He was sampled during the quarantine period of foreign returnees and declared negative. Later when he got an opportunity to sail to Sri Lanka, the Director General Shipping directed him to get tested again and procure a certificate declaring him Covid-19 negative.
“I headed out to Mohali where I was sampled at a private clinic and my samples were sent to a private lab in Chandigarh,” he recounts.
However, the result declared on June 24, said he was positive. “I was pretty sure I hadn’t contracted the virus as we had not left our homes and showed no symptoms at all. But with all that is going on, I still had some doubt and isolated myself at home,” he said.
They also decided to get tested again, this time at a government facility. “This was where all our troubles began. We went to the Panchkula civil hospital, they denied re-testing him saying that isn’t protocol. We then went to PGI where understanding our situation, they decided to test him,” says the wife.
A day later in samples taken by PGIMER, he was declared Covid-19 negative. “But I had already missed the opportunity of joining my ship by then. My flight had left on June 26, when I was struggling to get re-sampled. I was supposed to be in Kochi by now, where all those joining from Sri Lanka are being quarantined for a week,” he says, dejected.
“I have missed a very big and important opportunity, especially in these times. My certificate has already expired like many of us and the DG shipping office has had to get a special dispensation certificate for us each time a company agrees to let such officers sail. I don’t know when I will get another such opportunity,” he adds.
Talking about their breach of privacy, his wife says, “When he tested positive, the police officials procured all our call and location data for the past 15 days. They called each and every person we had even talked to for a short while and alerted them that we were positive. They called our closest members of the family and our most distant contacts. All of this, without our permission.”
These calls she says, led to chaos as everyone started enquiring about their health. “We requested them to postpone this calling just for a day till his re-sampling results came back, but no-one agreed. Even if it had been true, we wanted the right to be the first informants,” she adds.
The family also alleged that private information including their names, addresses were given out by the district administration and circulated among people.
“The whole sector knows our house now and so does the media. Isn’t it against the law to release someone’s personal details?” asked his wife.
Meanwhile, the couple has been going through daily life issues as people discriminate and authorities keeping an eye on their movement. “On Sunday when a team of officials came, we showed them my resampling test results. I was given no option but to get the results photocopied. When I did go out for the same, I started getting calls from the administration, shouting at me for leaving the home,” said the seafarer, adding, “This is when we have tested negative. What is our fault in this? Why has there been no action against the private lab? We do not know where to go and what to do.”
Even though only the couple have come forward to question the breach of their rights and point out a lack of sensitivity and coordination among authorities, their troubles don’t seem to stop.