Bihar minister, wife test positive for Covid-19

Bihar's Backward and Extremely Backward Classes Welfare Minister Vinod Kumar Singh and his wife tested positive for COVID-19 on Sunday and were sent to an isolation ward at a city hotel in Katihar district, officials said.

Katihar District Magistrate Kanwal Tanuj confirmed that both the minister and his wife have tested positive for the pathogen.

The couple has been kept at an isolation ward created at a city hotel here, the DM said.

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Singh, who is a BJP legislator from Pranpur, said his samples were tested in Patna and he returned to Katihar from the state capital on Sunday.

The minister said when he came to know about his test report, he first went to Katihar Medical College and Hospital and thereafter to the isolation ward of a hotel in the town.

People who came in contact with the minister will be traced to collect their samples for testing, the DM said.

This is the first incident when a minister of the Nitish Kumar government has tested positive for COVID-19.

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Earlier on June 22, a sitting BJP MLA Jibesh Kumar Mishra tested positive for the virus.

He was admitted to AIIMS, Patna for treatment and supervision. The MLA was the first sitting member of the bicameral legislature in the state to have been tested positive for COVID-19.

Earlier, veteran RJD leader Raghuvansh Prasad Singh, a former Union minister, was admitted to the hospital after testing positive for coronavirus.