Pramesh S Jain
The High grounds police have arrested a group of four persons including two lab employees who helped Omicron infected a South African national to escape from a star hotel where he was quarantined .
The accused have been identified as Ranesh and Ravindra,techies with an IT firm in Bommanahalli where the accused South African was working and the two lab employees Manoj and Prashanth.
Senior officer told media persons based on a complaint filed by the BBMP health officials the high grounds police swung into action and based on technical inputs and technical evidence the team arrested four persons two are lab technician and two are IT firm employees.
During investigation it was found that accused South-African national,who had tested covid positive after he landed in the airport on November 20 following which the authorities directed him to get quarantined at Shangri-La hotel on palace road until further orders.
The accused using his employees Ranesh and Ravindra obtained a fake covid negative report from the lab situated on old airport road,submitted the same to check out from the hotel on November 27 .
He later used the same report and left to his country via Dubai .
THe BBMP officials who got to know about this lodged a complaint with the High grounds police against him and the hotel management for failing to inform the BBMP about the check out and also under the Karnataka Epidemic Diseases Act.
As the accused and the hotel management allegedly violated the COVID-19 guidelines,Dr. Naveen Kumar M,the Medical Officer of Health of the BBMP East Division,filed a complaint with the High Grounds police on Sunday. Based on the complaint, the police have registered an FIR under sections 269 (negligent act likely to spread infection of disease dangerous to life), 271 (disobedience to quarantine rule), and other sections of the IPC and the provisions of the Karnataka Epidemic Diseases Act, 2020.
We are now probing further the possibility of the lab being issued similar negative certificates to any other in the recent past and further investigation is on.
