KATHMANDU: A total of 18 Nepali Muslims, who recently returned from India after participating in a congregation, have been kept in quarantine.

They had participated in a Tablighi Jamaat congregation in Nizamuddin area in New Delhi.

Famed for the shrine of the 14h century Sufi mystic Khwaja Nizamuddin Auliya, the Nizamuddin area of New Delhi has emerged as an epicenter for the spread of the coronavirus in different parts of India.

Indian authorities have launched a nationwide search for participants of the huge religious gathering amid fears that thousands present there could have carried the infection to the length and breadth of the country.

Various nationals, particularly from Indonesia, Malaysia, Thailand, Nepal, Myanmar, Bangladesh, Sri Lanka and Kyrgyzstan come for Tabligh activities in Delhi.