Three days after Shivraj Singh Chouhan, chief minister of the central Indian state of Madhya Pradesh blamed Tablighi Jamaat congregation for a spike in cases of coronavirus or COVID-19 in his state, officials and experts on Monday disputed his claim.
The state has emerged as one of the hotspots in India, reporting 564 cases with over 50 deaths so far. The twin historic cities of Indore and provincial capital Bhopal have recorded 281 and 131 positive cases respectively. As many as 30 people have died in Indore and three in Bhopal.
On April 11, Chief Minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan told Prime Minister Narendra Modi in a video conference that the spike in cases was due to people, who had returned from Delhi after attending a Tablighi Jamaat congregation from March 13-15 at its headquarters, known as Markaz in Nizamuddin locality.
“The problem had increased in Madhya Pradesh, like the rest of the country, because of those who had returned from Markaz,” he said.
The provincial government officials and experts, however, said that it was yet to be convincingly proved if attendees of the Tablighi Jamaat event were responsible for the transmission of the virus in Bhopal and Indore.
So far, 20 members of the Jamaat who had returned from the congregation have tested positive in Bhopal.
Speaking to Anadolu Agency on phone, Rahul Rokade of the Mahatma Gandhi Memorial Medical College in Indore said they have no data to link the spread of the pandemic in Bhopal and Indore to Tablighi Jamaat.
“We cannot say that members from Jamaat led to a spike in corona cases in Madhya Pradesh,” he said.
