In the zone of deep prayer
| Date :02-Jul-2020 |
Vijay Phanshikar :
Those who are not there, who are not involved, who are not needed to be engaged as part of duty will never understand the risks involved. But when the medical doctors are assigned to coronavirus duties, they actually buy risks which others are almost totally unlikely to understand. The doctors’ own sense of personal safety and security is assailed by the assignment.
Their families cry in desperation, in sheer helplessness. They -- the members of families -- understand the element of unavoidability of the assignment. Yet, very secretly, very deep within, they do not want the doctor to take up the task. “Can’t you avoid this?”, asked the teary-eyed and scared-to-the-bone mother of a medical doctor assigned to the coronavirus duty. That was the reason why the nation felt obliged to express gratefulness to all those medical doctors and paramedics for their plunge into the difficult assignment. That was also the reason that on Doctors’ Day, the city of Nagpur, too, felt obliged to say a silent, mental ‘thanks’ to all those warriors who have to go the closest possible to coronavirus patients, no matter the risk, no matter the doubts welling up in their minds.
True, they have the modern personal gear as protection. In pictures, that gear may have its own fascination for others. But once the doctor or the paramedic gets into that outfit, he -- or she -- gets into claustrophobic world inside the thin membrane that separates him -- or her -- from predictably unpredictable risk. In that terribly constrained space, the movement is terribly restricted, and a sense of psychological helplessness engulfs the mind from within. The duty must be done faithfully, but in one corner of the mind the cry keeps erupting asking the person to jump out and vanish into a safer zone. There is, undoubtedly, a practised professional competence and confidence at work.
Yet, from another angle, there is a personal shakiness about the element of uncertainty involved in the assignment. ‘Will I be safe?’, each doctor or paramedic asks of self. It is this question that makes things truly, truly difficult. It is not without reason that these people are called corona-warriors. But, the element of honour that has got attached to duty in Armed Forces uniform traditionally is yet to get attached to these doctors and paramedics on coronavirus duty. Having known quite a few doctors and paramedics engaged in coronavirus assignment, one of them very closely and personally, I can vouchsafe the mental trauma of the relatives when somebody gets assigned to the duty.
I can say from my own traumatic emotion that such assignment is bloody tough for the relatives to endure. When my ‘little one’ opted for the assignment, I did feel a surge of insecurity. But I also felt a surge of pride that she has the courage and conviction. Despite all this, these brave-hearts take the plunge. They are not without fear. They are not without doubts. Yet, no matter what, they take the plunge -- in the process leaving all their near and dear ones into profound doubts. But then, they also leave the relatives in a sublime zone of prayer! That prayer is the reward, may I say!