How Nagaland Police built Dimapur’s Covid quarantine centre that can host more than 1,000

The facility released its last batch of people on 30 June. It will now be a standalone quarantine centre for personnel of the India Reserve Battalion.

A total of 509 returnees from Bengaluru, including 383 men and 126 women, made up the first batch to be quarantined at the facility | Yimkumla Longkumer | ThePrint

Dimapur: With around 1,027 beds, the Ganeshnagar Covid quarantine centre in Nagaland’s Dimapur, set up and managed solely by the state police, is one of the largest facilities in all of Northeast India, and the largest in the state to be run by the police.

The centre has been built in a Special Economic Zone in Ganeshnagar, which had a number of unused buildings. Initially, 640 police personnel were involved in preparing it as a quarantine centre, but that number was cut down by almost half later.

ThePrint’s Yimkumla Longkumer and Angana Chakrabarti bring you a glimpse of the quarantine facility in Dimapur.

The facility was set up in a special economic zone (SEZ) in Ganeshnagar that already had a number of unused buildings and warehouses | Yimkumla Longkumer | ThePrint

Restoration work by the Nagaland Police during the initial days included clearing the wild vegetation that had grown on the building | By special arrangement

A contingent of 640 police personnel, including officers, was involved in setting up the quarantine facility for the first batch of people, but the workforce was cut down to 340 personnel as the project progressed | Yimkumla Longkumer | ThePrint

The police team had installed power and water supply connections and set up makeshift toilets, so that at least basic amenities were taken care of | Yimkumla Longkumer | ThePrint

Apart from temperature screening twice daily, the police medical team had to also collect swab samples from those in quarantine. The samples were tested using the TrueNat system | Yimkumla Longkumer | ThePrint

Around 40 to 50 beds were kept ready inside one of the warehouses to accommodate the first lot of inmates | By special arrangement

Machang, an Ao-Naga term for a platform typically made of bamboo, is used to keep food for the inmates | Yimkumla Longkumer | ThePrint

The facility released its last batch of inmates on 30 June, after they completed the 14-day mandatory quarantine. The facility is now set to be converted into a standalone quarantine centre for the India Reserve Battalion (IRB) personnel of the Nagaland Police | Yimkumla Longkumer | ThePrint