real concern
Date :09-Sep-2020
GIVEN the size of its geography and demography, India has taken its own and long time of six-plus months to earn the undesirable epithet of being the world’s second worst COVID-hit country. But as India surpasses Brazil in its COVID-19 statistics, the concern assumes a more dangerous proportion, necessitating more stringent measures to put brakes to the spread of the disease the like of which the world had never seen. Sensing serious trouble, the Central Government directed States and Union Territories to ramp up their efforts to combat the pandemic, just two days ago. And the first direction is in favour of stepped up testing so that no person stays without identification and subsequent treatment, containment of the spread being the foremost concern.
There are reasons to believe that these steps would help the nation check unrestrained growth of the pandemic. Of course, the overall statistics do suggest that the number of recovered persons in India is much higher than the number of currently active cases. But what sends shock-waves down the spine is the fact that the number of persons getting affected in single 24-hour-days is also rising alarmingly. More than 71,000 persons have already succumbed to the disease, making everybody truly worried. This is the stage that mandates a serious rethink of how the nation -- the Government and the people -- handled the challenge. Initially, the entire effort seemed to be going in the right direction, earning encomiums from all over the world.
All statistical figures were down to the minimum and everybody felt that defeating the disease was only a matter of time. Perhaps, that is also where the nation started slipping on the performance scale in the fight against the pandemic. Perhaps, over-confidence and casualness seemed to have overtaken the national mood, leading to a chaotic state -- whose dimensions are becoming increasingly visible by now. Let us not miss the point. The Government has already undertaken a serious review of its performance and would soon introduce appropriate course-correction.
In a few days, a lot of positive change may come over due to that review. However, what is more needed at this stage is a review of how the general people are conducting themselves particularly when the Unlock process has entered the crucial fourth stage. It must be admitted that the people in general do not reflect a sense of emergency in their overall conduct in public. They still jostle, run into one another in shops and markets, gather in good numbers doing things, spit anywhere, do not maintain Do Gaz Ki Doori, and even refuse wearing face masks in public. There is a very large section of the population trying to run down the official effort to contain things. At several places across the country, political leadership seemed to have entered into a conflict with the bureaucracy, brining to halt all efforts. All this suggests a massive cultural lapse -- for which the nation is being made to pay in difficult terms.
If the Government’s efforts are to bring about a positive change, then those will have to be supplemented sufficiently by the people’s equal effort to cooperate with the administration and come up with creative ideas to contain the ugly spread of the disease. Let us not overlook the fact that this is a joint fight and not restricted only to the administration. If as a nation we do not make quick amends in our conduct -- both at the administrative and popular levels, we may end up into a bigger mess whose resolution would pose an impossible-to-handle challenge in no time.
It is obvious that the nation has arrived at a crucial cross-roads and must think properly before taking the next step into a possible new direction if needed. Any slip at this stage may lead us to terrible experiences which many other nations -- like the United States of America -- have had to suffer. And that must be avoided at any cost, absolutely.