On Sunday, two bike-borne miscreants dumped five currency notes of ₹100 near the village of Bijhera in Tehsil Iglas in Aligarh, after they reportedly spit on them. The incident had triggered a state of panic among the villagers who dubbed their action as a deliberate attempt to spread the Wuhan Coronavirus infection.
A young woman who was working in the field at the time of the event is the primary eye witness in the case. According to the villagers, the miscreants had covered their faces with cloths who stopped on the road, spat on the notes and threw them on the ground before leaving the spot. Soon the news spread in the village and the villagers gathered at the spot. The cops were called in to investigate the matter. The fear of contracting Coronavirus infection was such that none dared to touch the currency notes. According to Kotwal Ramsiya Maurya, the notes were seized and the villagers were assured of stringent action against the accused.
In a similar incident on Thursday, two unattended currency notes of ₹500 had created a sense of panic among the residents in Paper Mill Colony in Lucknow. The locals insisted that the notes were kept on the road to deliberately transmit the Wuhan Coronavirus infection. The cops were called in and a doctor was also briefed about the situation. The notes were kept separately for 24 hours. While ensuring social distancing, the residents of the colony engaged in serious discussion beyond midnight about how currency notes were used to spread coronavirus.
The fear of people about the transmission of Coronavirus through banknotes well be grounded on certain events in the recent past. Earlier, the Nashik police had taken to Twitter to inform that a Muslim man, whose video of licking and wiping nose with a bunch of currency notes and calling Coronavirus a punishment by Allah was doing rounds on social media, was in the police custody. The Muslim man in the video used few 500 denominations notes to wipe his nose and mouth as he looked into the camera and said, “There is no cure for a disease like Corona because it is the punishment of Allah, for you people.”
