India’s Covid-19 problems seem to be getting worse by the day no matter what authorities there try to do to contain the spread of what is still the second wave of the coronavirus in that country. Unfortunately, despite the gravity of the situation and some very serious orders coming out of New Delhi, all official actions and warnings are still half-hearted efforts at best, because the government doesn’t seem to have any problems with allowing religious festivals and political gatherings despite the country recording some of the worst daily cases and numbers of deaths for quite a while now.
That of course explains why the Modi government has been losing support and approval ratings so fast. It has, in effect, become the prisoner of its own electoral voter base. For when it has nothing else working for it, it naturally finds it very hard to annoy hardline Hindutva adherents by asking them to follow safety procedures and social distancing in what are religiously very sensitive times for them. Therefore it was no surprise that no order came from anybody, all the way up to the prime minister, as recent religious gatherings made a joke of all official restrictions and also the many, many people who have fallen seriously sick or even died.
Now the virus has travelled from dense main cities all the way to the periphery, where most of the country’s poor people live and where they grow the crops that people eat round the year. And with the second wave showing no signs of abating anytime soon, questions are being raised about the rising trend of daily deaths especially as they now threaten to compromise India’s bread basket by wiping out the very people who work on agriculture and, to cut a very long story short, are responsible for putting food on tables across the country. Just out of sheer arrogance Delhi is also not open to any help from the outside; like friendly gestures from Pakistan which should have been accepted in light of the thaw that is being worked on between the two countries if for nothing else. With almost 1.6m new cases for the week and the country’ total tally standing somewhere around 22 million, it will take more than ego to wriggle out of this mess so the sooner PM Modi starts showing a little flexibility the better for his people, country and his own political career.
