As coronavirus cases in the country surge past 400, a priest in Kerala who conducted a mass at a church defying a government order against public gatherings was arrested on Monday while authorities in Tamil Nadu plan to paste 'Do Not Visit' stickers outside houses of home quarantined people.
Police also lodged criminal cases against home quarantined persons who ventured outside and have warned that violators of home quarantine order will face arrest.
The total number of COVID-19 cases in the country surged to 415, a spike from the figure of 360 the night before, according to the Union Health Ministry.
In Kerala, priest Pauly Padayatti, Vicar of the Lady of Perpetual Help church at Koodapuzha in Chalakudy, conducted the mass on Monday morning in which at least 100 people had participated, police said. The priest was arrested and later let off on bail.
A case under sections 269 IPC (Negligent act likely to spread infection of diseases dangerous to life) and 118e of the Kerala Police Act (causing danger to public) has been registered against the priest and the 100-odd faithful.
In Tamil Nadu, the greater Chennai Corporation said as many as 3,000 homes are under the quarantine watch for coronavirus and they will be stamped with stickers to ensure social distancing, the city civic body said.
"All the houses where suspected home quarantine people are residing, stickers will be pasted for alerting others and to ensure social distancing," the city civic body said in a release. The green and red coloured stickers will have COVID19-Do Not Visit-Home Under Quarantine.
The corporation, the biggest in Tamil Nadu, said "right now 3,000 homes are under quarantine watch in greater Chennai corporation limits."
An FIR was registered against him for violating home quarantine norms and the person was sent to an institutional quarantine facility, he said
As many as 3,474 persons from Odisha who returned from abroad have so far registered themselves under the state government's Covid-19 portal, according to Subroto Bagchi, the state government's chief spokesperson on COVID-19,