Fifty days and are things looking up ?
The lockdown has reached the end of version3.0 and many states will see lockdown4.0 in some new form and stricter rules to be followed.
Who would need maximum care and mandatory stay at home instructions?
Those above 60 and 65 will have to be indoors safe secure and healthy.
Lessons learnt from the lockdown 1 to 3 are
a. States that first asked the migrant labour and workers in homes farms, shops and factories to leave the state when they were asked to stay out in places will not see them return soon. The labour from UP will surely never return.
b. Delhi will never see Bihar migrants and workers again for the simple reason that they were humiliated and asked to leave fraudulently . Some died attempting the impossible option of walking home in intense heat, dust and hungry in some cases.
c. UP was daring in getting back its students stuck in some states with the CM being old to send buses to pick them.
d. UP could get maximum new employment options with planned projects and quick implementation of the same. In this case the labour may never go back to the states where they had been evacuated from.
e. It seems the workers who were transported back home by Haryana would like to return to their original places of work. This speaks volumes of their experience in that state.
After 50 days are we even ready to open up transport sector ? The cancellation of trains upto 30th June scares me. Without railways functioning normally it’s not possible to move populations between states in large numbers. Some states are not ready to take back more trouble for their over burdened hospitals and treatment staff .
Delhi appears to have taken the risk of opening up without proper back up of facilities for labour who need to stay close or inside the work places.
Mumbai is a case study in challenges of managing hospitals and managing PR of the CM.
The CM has chosen to silence critics media and opponents by filing multiple cases and running between HC and Supreme Court with no easy victories.
The next few days will decide the future of India’s health system , economy and state governance. Declaring packages for MSMEs and Micro sectors won’t be successful without RBI and bankers pulling up their socks. With bankers killing demonetisation through strange methods this package would fail with corrupt bankers and their lethargic ways of dealing with unsecured loanees. I am sure they will scuttle this idea of handing out doles without security.
Karnataka and UP have put in place some credible systems to trace quarantine and treat with care and some states has chosen playing with data and dodging statistics to misguide readers.
Prayers and faith are needed in days ahead for the safety of the population in India. Resolute leadership will be needed for good days and strong support from financial institutions.
Muralidharan R Nair
51st day of lockdown
Economic packages Bangalore
15th May 2020
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