5 ED officials test positive for COVID-19, headquarters sealed
New Delhi: Five Enforcement Directorate (ED) employees, including a special director rank officer, have tested positive for COVID-19, following which the headquarters of the central probe agency have been sealed for 48 hours till Monday, officials said.
Out of the five, two are contract employees. The employees were found infected after the agency carried out section-wise testing at its headquarters in the wake of some COVID-19 cases being reported from other floors of the Lok Nayak Bhawan in Khan Market, where the ED office is located, the officials said on Saturday.
All the ED employees who were found infected with COVID-19 after "proactive testing" are asymptomatic, they said.
According to the officials, the employees who have tested positive include a special director rank officer and an investigating officer. All of them have been admitted to isolation facilities for treatment.
People who came in contact with them have been quarantined, they added.
As per procedure, the headquarters of the agency have been sealed for 48 hours and are expected to resume operations on Monday, the officials said.
The affected employees have not been coming to office since they tested positive, they said.
In order to check the spread of COVID-19, a protocol has been put in place for sanitising the ED headquarters twice a week and all documents. 'Daak' (post) is sanitised before it is handed over to officers and other staff of the agency, they added.
Last month, too, an ED employee had tested positive for COVID-19.
The ED is the federal agency that investigates money laundering, black money and hawala crimes under the Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA) and the Foreign Exchange Management Act (FEMA).
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RJD surprise element in J’khand polls, party candidates leading in 5 of 6 assembly seats
Ranchi(PTI): The Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD) has emerged as a surprise element in the Jharkhand assembly elections with its candidates leading in five of the six seats where the party is contesting, according to trends available on the Election Commission's website on Saturday.
RJD candidates in five assembly seats were leading over sitting BJP legislators.
In 2019, RJD had secured only the Chatra seat where its nominee Satyanand Bhokta won.
In Deoghar, RJD’s Suresh Paswan was leading by 19,581 votes over his nearest rival and BJP's sitting MLA Narayan Das after the third round of counting.
RJD’s Sanjay Prasad Yadav was ahead by 19,867 votes in Godda over BJP MLA Amit Kumar Mandal after the sixth round of counting.
In Koderma, RJD nominee Subhash Prasad Yadav, who was out on bail, was leading by a margin of 3,471 votes over BJP’s sitting legislator Neera Yadav.
Subhas Prasad Yadav, considered to be one of the close aides of RJD supremo Lalu Prasad, was recently granted bail by the Supreme Court in a money laundering case.
Party’s Naresh Prasad Singh was leading by 5,159 votes after the fourth round of counting over BJP’s Bishrampur MLA Ramchandra Chandravanshi.
RJD's Sanjay Kumar Singh Yadav was also leading from Hussainabad by 8,213 votes after the fourth round of counting over BJP MLA Kamlesh Kumar Singh.
Party’s candidate Rashmi Prakash, however, was trailing from Chatra by 3,776 votes.
Bhokta did not contest the elections this time, and his daughter-in-law Prakash was given a ticket.
