Though late, the government and its administrative machinery have started the battle to defeat the virus with people’s active support. Several measures are on the anvil starting with ‘Janata Curfew’. From March 25, a country wide lock down is declared for 21 days. People are asked to remain at home to avoid any kind of social gatherings. True, that is the most dependable strategy to break the chain. The Prime Minister and his government make repeated appeals to the citizens to that effect.
In such a huge country like ours with 130 crores of people, it is extremely difficult to implement such quarantine. The economics, politics and sociology of this question need to be analyzed. The people who are asked to volunteer isolation are from different socio-economic strata. For majority, to remain at home is to go hungry. It is a privileged concept beyond their reach. To reign in the spread of a fierce virus, remain at home for some weeks sounded very attractive. But livelihood of millions of people is the most serious issue to be addressed in this regard. The prime minister while appealing the people to remain at home has not considered this aspect. In his typical style in the second address the prime minister exhorted: “Draw a Lakshman Rekha outside your house door and do not step outside of it. Stay where you are. …If we are not able to adhere to the lockdown sincerely for 21 days, believe me, India will go back to 21 years”.
Despite the haunting disaster, for majority of people to remain within the Lakshman Rekha will be a matter of life and survival as they are dependent upon their daily wage for existence. They are in the unorganized sector, consisting of no less than 93 percent of total work force in the country. If they don’t step out, they would have no pay and no food. Their families will be starved. The government has virtually stopped publishing any data about them. Even the NSSO is shelved. Still there are attempts from concerned citizens and reliable research groups to make such studies. The data published by them was branded as “statistical Shaheen Bagh” by the parliamentarians of the ruling party. And their share in the labour market is always on the increase as the aftermath of migration from rural India to urban. They are living in the ghettos of fast-growing Indian cities where health care and sanitation are not even heard of. Majority of them are homeless. These are the tragic byproducts of globalisation and market driven economy. The slogan “sab ka sath, sabka vikas” remains hollow for them. Corona days insist upon every right-thinking person to feel concerned about the plight of these citizens who form a major chunk of the wealth creators and never there is any applaud for them.
It is estimated that in every minute 25-30 people are forced to migrate from villages to cities in search of better livelihood. They may even be termed as climate refugees. Because climate change and the resultant ruin of the agriculture based rural economy also contribute to this phenomenon. Following the large-scale migration slums are coming up in the back yards of every city. Certain studies reveal that more than 10 percent of the national population lives in urban slums. And human beings are forced to live like worms. In almost all these slums safe drinking water is a distant dream. Now, if these people are asked to sit in their homes, their subsistence would be a big question mark. Prime Minister wanted them only to sit at home. Till now their livelihood issues were not mentioned by the government. People expect government of India to come out with a comprehensive package to support these segments marginalized by all means. The meagre sum of 15,000 crores announced by the PM is not meant to meet the needs of those jobless people, it is for infrastructure arrangements but for that also is disappointingly too little.
Covid-19 outbreak urges all to open their eyes to the gravest challenges of our times — global warming. It is high time the world should understand the disastrous impact of global warming on humankind. Many people, including leaders of governments opted to believe that global warming is something related to heightened temperature in the atmosphere only. And the ideological supporters of market greed were always eager to underplay the gravity of the possible infringement it could affect on every aspects of human life. Climate change has turned upside down many a notion that global warming could be faced with easy measures. No, it is not at all so simple a challenge as some of them attempt to make us believe. Its impact will not limit itself to temperature alone. It has already done irreparable damages to the oceans, forests and mountains. It has polluted the air, water and atmosphere to unimaginable extent. It serves as the womb of all sorts of deadly viruses causing epidemics and pandemics. Since long there were alert calls from scientists and environmentalists. In many instances people at the helm of affairs took it as casual. Their alarm signals about food refugees and climate refugees were ignored. Their warnings about epidemics and unheard health hazards were sometimes even poohpoohed by the protagonists of unbridled profit-oriented development. If we are honest to the future generations, we should not be hesitant to educate ourselves on the inter-relations between global warming and spread of epidemics. (IPA Service)
AMID CORONAVIRUS LOCKDOWN, WHO WILL SUPPORT THE POOR?
GOVERNMENT RELIEF MEASURES OVERLOOK MIGRANT WORKERS
Binoy Viswam - 2020-03-27 10:42
These are the days of unprecedented suffering, unusual for any country. The outbreak and spread of COVID-19, caused by the Coronavirus, has literally locked down the nation. The pandemic that originated from China, passing through Europe has come to India. Though there were ample warnings from scientists and health experts, the government took it in a light vein. Now that the disaster has struck, entire country is in the grip of pandemic. But as a country and a people we have to face the reality and overcome it.