Stigmatisation haunts Upper New Nongstoin residents

NONGSTOIN: Amid the lockdown which was imposed by the Village Dorbar of Upper New Nongstoin in Block-III, it was alleged that one person who was the primary contact of a COVID patient in Shillong tested positive but in the result that was declared in Shillong on Saturday, the primary contact was shown as negative.
As per the fact finding team, rumours were spread by some people which led to the lockdown at Block-III, Upper New Nongstoin.
It was also found that even before the declaration of test result, the members of the family and the residents of Block III had faced stigmatisation from people at Nongstoin town.
”Some residents at Upper New Nongstoin had looked down upon our family members and even said that we have to be responsible for everything, while others spread the news that all of our family members have the virus and that we are not allowed to go out and buy biscuits and essential commodities” one of the family members said.
The family member added that they had to face a lot of problems. Our mother was in ICU for almost three weeks, our youngest sister suffered from heart ailment and another sister was attending to our mother in Civil Hospital Shillong. Yet they blamed us and we are happy that we have proved them wrong”, the family member said.
The people also stigmatised the residents of Block-III who survive by small business activities. Due to stigmatisation, no one bought things from them in the past four days and this has also affected those who sell chicken on the road side because of the rumours that all residents of Block-III came in contact with the secondary and primary contacts of the COVID patient in Shillong.
The Deputy Commissioner of West Khasi Hills, T. Lyngwa, in a statement, has clarified that there
) is no danger of virus spreading as the COVID-19 patient was in Shillong and even the primary contact also was in Shillong. The primary contact has completed the test.
Since the result was negative, the deputy commissioner issued a stern warning that the spreading of rumours should be stopped.
He also said those who spread rumours will face penalty under Section 51 to 60 of the Disaster Management Act 2005 and they will face jail term for one year besides fine.