Coronavirus pandemic | Coal India arm SECL sends 50 employees to home quarantine

The Coal India-arm South Eastern Coalfields Ltd (SECL) in Chhattisgarh’s Korba district has sent about 50 employees to home quarantine after they attended a religious event, Business Standard has reported.

The move was taken after a participant of the religious gathering tested positive for the novel coronavirus, said the report.

The religious event was held on April 3, in which people – all belonging to a minority community – participated by defying the health guidelines and also curfew-like lockdown imposed by the Chhattisgarh government, said the report, citing Korba district administration.

After the event, one of the persons present in the event was tested positive for coronavirus. The person had been admitted to All India Institute of Medical Sciences (AIIMS) in Raipur.

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Among the other participants, about 50 were working with a coal mining project of SECL. Taking note of it, the SECL management issued an order asking the employees not to report on duty and stay in the 28-day home quarantine starting April 6.

These employees were part of mining operation in the underground mine of the SECL, said the report.

Meanwhile, state-owned CIL has developed a sanitising chamber for disinfecting its mine workers and containing the spread of the deadly coronavirus that has wreaked havoc across the world.

The sanitising chamber at one of the mines of SECL has already been commissioned, an official told news agency PTI. Each worker of SECL at the Bartunga Hill Mine in Chhattisgarh enters the sanitising chamber where a disinfectant is sprayed over the full-body, making the worker safe and sanitised, the official said.

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