Such a strong hope was kindled with emergence of the two Indian made corona virus vaccines in the month of December 2020, which were given ‘emergency use approval’ in the first week of 2021, and vaccination started on January 16. It has been causing despair slowly disappearing. The first doses have already been given to lakhs of health workers, though many of them were hesitant on being inoculated. The second doses are yet to be administered. It is not a small news in this context to have achieved zero covid death.

The story of this achievement is one of the most breathtaking one, that we have underwent swinging between hope and despair ever since the first case of corona virus disease was identified on January 30, 2020, in Kerala. Reports coming out from China’s Wuhan city soon spread the horror of it among Indians, though its spread was very slow at that time. The nature of the contagion however made the Union Government panicked and general lockdown of the country was announced on March 24, when there was yet only about a dozen deaths with less than 500 reported cases. On that date Delhi-NCR had only 49 cases, out of which 18 were recovered, and one death.

Because of its being most densely populated state, the threat of the contagion was looming large on its population. The state was particularly important because of its being the Nation Capital Territory. Precautionary measures have already been taken by the state government, such as prohibitory orders of all kinds of assemblies and protests. However, there was a great problem on removing the protestors of CAA and NRC who were on sit-on at Shaheen Bagh. However, wisdom prevailed on the both sides and the place of cleared of protestors without great difficulty.

The first lockdown period was for 21 days during which Delhi registered a sharp increase in coronavirus cases. On 21st day of the lockdown Delhi had 1510 cases only second after Maharashtra’s 2337. On that day all India tally was around eleven thousand. By that time 28 people were dead of the disease in Delhi. The sharp rise in infection was attributed chiefly to Tablighi Jamaat who had held a congregation in Delhi’s Nizamuddin Markaz Mosque in early March, and a worst kind of communal campaign was directed against Muslim community, and the political establishments at the centre and the state indulged in attacking each other in a bid to save their skins by putting blame on each other. However, the Jamat members were tracked down all over the country, and also in Delhi, to prevent spread of the contagion. It was a very saddening moment for the state and the country not only for contagion but for several other reasons including the malignant campaigns.

Within the first week of lockdown, the state witnessed a great chaos at its borders where lakhs of migrant labours tried to catch buses to go their home despite assurance by the centre and the state of protecting their interests. The migrants did not believed the government assurances because the promised help were not reaching them in time. Both the governments were to blame because they were not prepared for the consequences of the lockdown. The situation came under control but only after a great effort and loss, even of lives.

In the meantime the medical facilities of the state were overwhelmed due to spread of the infection. We must appreciate, which is overdue to the state government, that had already done commendable works in the field of education and health. Though the health infrastructure and facilities had been already revamped to a great extent, it fell short of the requirement of the upsurge in number of covid patients. Makeshift arrangements done were tremendously under pressure because the beds were occupied even by the patients coming from outside Delhi, specially NCR. The stress on the state made the ruling establishment to make some distressing statements, but in the interest of the patients, they worked in right earnest.

When unlocking was started on June 1, it was implemented with great care. Educational institutions are yet to open is just the manifestation of the care the government has been taking all along. Despite these, by the last week of June, Delhi overtook Mumbai to become India’s biggest COVID-19 hotspot with 70,390 cases with daily addition of around 3800. It was dreaded on account of its being densely populated with a population of round 2 crore. The state and the centre worked hard to prevent a catastrophe.

Today, total cases in the state has reached 6,36,000 and 10,882 lives have been lost. Around 6,24,000 patients have recovered and discharged. It is indicative of the efforts that we have put in containing the disease and also the lapses in course of planning and implementation of the measures. Sero-surveys conducted in the state also suggest far more infections that might have led to some level of herd immunity among the people, even then we must not undermine the efforts that were made, though not up to the level we have wished for.

Nevertheless, the state has registered zero death for the first time in over 10 months with the positivity rate dipping to 0.18 per cent and only about 100 new cases is a great achievement. Arvind Kejrival, the Chief Minister of Delhi, has rightly asserted it as victory of “Collective Will”, but the whole struggle has many lessons to be learned and many lapses to be avoided to consolidate this gain and replicate it across the country in shortest possible time.
(IPA Service)