1903 plague outbreak in Kashmir bears similarities to coronavirus pandemic

Ishfaq Tantry
Tribune News Service
Srinagar, April 10

Kashmir witnessed a severe outbreak of imported plague in 1903, where the infected hid their travel histories and government failed to quarantine—similar to what the region is facing amidst the coronavirus pandemic.

The Kashmir valley witnessed a severe and widespread outbreak of plague from November 19, 1903, to July 31, 1904.

The disease did not originate here, but was imported from outside when three travellers—a Kashmiri-origin woman, Mrs Bailey, and her two servants travelled from Rawalpindi. They came in a horse cart and passed two screening points undetected on the Srinagar-Muzaffarabad road, then known as the Jhelum Valley cart road.

The travellers hid their travel history and did not disclose that one of the servants was unwell.

The same situation is being witnessed currently as travellers are hiding their travel history and the government has failed to quarantine all travellers to Kashmir.

As the plague had already hit Jammu, Poonch and Rawalpindi before it reached Kashmir, the Maharaja Amar Singh government, which then ruled the princely state of J-K, made arrangements for the examination of the travellers to Kashmir. The screening was to be done at Ramban on the Srinagar-Jammu road and Kohala and Uri on the cart road, in the undivided Kashmir, according to a report by A Mittal, then Chief Medical Officer of Kashmir, who traced the origin and spread of the plague.

The report notes that one plague-hit person from Rawalpindi, had died in Uri on October 8, 1903, and was cremated there.

It adds that elaborate arrangements for the decontamination of the area were made. But on November 13, 1903, a “veiled native Kashmiri woman”, in a horse cart, with two servants crossed the Uri examination point, where the temperature of each traveller was being taken.

“In this case, the inspectors failed to detect the disease. Subsequent investigation revealed that they had taken the temperature of the tonga travellers but their temperature was normal at that time,” the report adds.

The woman, along with her servants, had reached Srinagar on November 13 evening and checked into a houseboat at Shiekhbagh near Lal Chowk. 

The report says they had left for Kralpora in Budgam on November 16, where they stayed at the house of Subhan Bhat, the woman’s relative.

However, one of the servants, Ghulam Mohammad, fell ill and was taken to State Hospital in Srinagar on November 18.

At the hospital, he was immediately isolated after diagnosis of plague symptoms by the doctors.

“The symptoms at once suggested (to doctors) plague and he has removed to an isolated tent away from the city in an open place, where a policeman was kept for a guard, 500 metres away,” says the report.

However, the servant died on the night of November 19, becoming the first imported case of plague in the Kashmir valley, the report notes.

He was buried in a 10-foot-deep grave with 2-feet of carbonate of lime surrounding it to further prevent the spread of disease. 

“Only two persons helped in the burial,” the report says.

As a precautionary measure, the house of Subhan Bhat along with all its belongings was burnt down by the authorities and the deceased’s close contacts, including the woman and the second servant, the policeman who guarded his tent and a hospital attendant were isolated and quarantined, it says.

“However the woman, servants and other contacts at Subhan Bhat house did not develop plague symptoms.”

On the night of November 25, 1903, the policeman who guarded the tent of the plague-hit servant also died. He was buried in a 10-feet grave in an open place.

Though there was no witness, the report says that the policeman and his brother, who was the hospital attendant, had come in close contact with the deceased servant while trying to steal his belongings from the tent after he passed away. The hospital attendant is said to have tried to remove a ring from the corpse with his teeth.

The hospital attendant, who was put in quarantine, went missing from the camp on November 28, 1903, and was never found.

Soon after the policeman’s death, there was an outbreak of plague in Srinagar on December 11, 1903. Five sudden deaths were reported in two houses in the Karfali Mohallah and Kralgund locality of Srinagar, all relatives of the policeman and his absconding brother, as they had visited the deceased policeman during his illness.

Four days later, two cases were found at Khanyar and Fateh Kadal, and both were relatives of the sick policemen and had visited the other sick at Karfali Mohallah.

The disease soon spread to Guru village in Awantipora and Kripalpora in Pattan, north Kashmir, as both villages had been visited by the infected relatives of the dead policeman. The disease only stopped in July 1904 after over eight months. It devoured thousands of human lives across the length and breadth of Kashmir.