Kerala Chief
Minister Pinarayi Vijayan along with other top officials who visited the Kozhikode plane
crash site are going into self-quarantine, reported news agency ANI on Friday. This comes after 22 officials who were involved in the crash rescue work tested coronavirus positive.

“Kerala CM Pinarayi Vijayan
& others who visited Kozhikode plane crash site are going into
self-quarantine. Co-operation & Devaswom Minister Kadakampally Surendran
will hoist national flag at Independence Day function to be held in
Thiruvananthapuram tomorrow: Kerala CMO,” ANI tweeted.

Earlier in the
day, over 20 officials who were involved in the Kozhikode plane crash
rescue work tested positive for coronavirus. According to reports, the list of
coronavirus positive people includes Malappuram District Collector K
Gopalakrishnan and a few other top officials who had visited the crash site.

Health authorities are now
scanning through the contact list of the affected people to contain the spread
of the disease. Several top administrative officials and ministers had visited
the accident site last Friday and Saturday.

Earlier, test report of two fire
and rescue department officials had come positive on Thursday.

An Air India Express flight from
Dubai had overshot the runway and topped into a valley at Karipur aiport killing 18
people, including both the pilots on August 7.

The flight was being operated
under the Vande Bharat Mission that expatriates Indians stuck in foreign
countries due to coronavirus pandemic.