India amidst The Coronavirus Pandemic

Friday, June 5, 2020

At the time of writing this article, India stands seventh amongst countries worst hit by Covid-19 crisis, just behind Italy, which, once, was far ahead of us.

So where exactly did we go wrong?.... Here's my view on it. Before getting started, let me make it clear that all the thoughts expressed in this are personal, and that I do not associate myself with any of the political parties and/or Right/Left wing organisation(s). Also, my thoughts are purely based on information available in the public domain and nothing more.

Imposing Lockdown 

We got into lockdown without actually being sure of its effectiveness in Indian scenario. We are India. We need customisation in literally everything- right from our hairstyle, to the clothes we wear, the gadgets we use. In a nutshell, what may work in some other region, say the West, whom we always idealise, may NOT work the same way here, whether it's lockdown or wearing a three piece suit in Thar, it's the same thing, it's not made for us.

You might say China has been successful in controlling the pandemic, using a similar strategy. But hey, are we same as the Chinese? Nope.

The Chinese people are used to the authoritarian rule that they've, since the Chinese revolution. People there listen to the government, in a way we cannot imagine, or shall we say, they're bound to obey? Either way, implementation of something as serious and complex as lockdown is far more easy and effective in an authoritarian regime, than in a Quasi-Federal democracy like ours, where it takes a lot to get everything work in sync.

The Economic Impact

As it is our economy wasn't growing the way it was expected to, thanks to Demonetisation and GST. No, I'm not suggesting that Demonetisation was wrong move, or that GST isn't the right thing, but, after drastic changes to economy, with less buffer between the two, it is, but natural for an economy, so diverse and informal as ours, would take time to recover and grow the way it has been in the  pre-Demonetisation or pre-GST era. Unfortunately for us, we had a third and huge hurdle waiting for us-Coronavirus.

The Stimulus Package

"What's the use of Supplying a product, when there's zero demand for the same in the market?" Surely one doesn't need to have a  business mind to answer this simple question. It's common sense. You make something only when you are sure of selling that and make money out of it.

The Stimulus Package is something opposite to this. It aims to create more supply, when there's bare minimum, if not zero, demand. Again, the idea of making more loans available with less interest is not bad by any means. But why would someone take loans and make something just to stock things up. It would have been great if this would have been implemented before the pandemic. It would have created more jobs, by means of expanding businesses, and help the government to decrease the unemployment rate.

One thing that irritates me the most is the way this is being used as a political tool. Isn't it the government's duty to revive the economy? Then why is it being marketed as something that's unique and flamboyant? 'The 20 lakh crore' package in reality does not infuse the amount it has in it's title, infact, it pumps in far less liquidity, and, most of it, to the sectors, which wouldn't have needed that much. The government, instead of putting cash into the hands of people in the informal sector ( labourers, auto drivers, etc), is giving out groceries and other things, of course groceries are needed, but why not give them money instead? They could buy whatever they need, in quantities they need.

UNLOCK INDIA

We're opening up ourselves when we are facing increased number of cases everyday, Unlike other nations, where the peak is over and the curve has been flattened. The only thing the lockdown could manage is to buy us some time, which is evident from the graph in the first image. But I wonder if we have any use of that time now. Bit by bit, many nations are opening themselves up, to kickstart the economy and save themselves from recession, even India is doing the same. But there's a key difference. While the curves are pretty much flat elsewhere, we haven't yet peaked!

When we imposed lockdown, India had cases in hundreds and deaths in tens/twenties. Now when we are opening up, the cases are in lakhs and deaths in thousands. While we were in lockdown, few nations like Japan and others took a calculative approach to the situation, and, instead of imposing a nation wide lockdown, closed the containment areas, while letting others to have restricted economic activity. Shouldn't we have done that? Nobody can say for sure, but the prospect seems better.

Sometimes, it looks like, as if the central government is trying to run away from the situation, rather than facing it. States are being given more power now, when the situation is spiralling out of control. Couldn't they do that before? Probably not impose a nation wide lockdown, and let states look after containment zones, with restricted domestic travel? Couldn't they have done that? Again, no one knows.

Getting back to Normalcy

We can not sit in homes forever, can we? 

To save our economics and to get back our growth rate and to achieve everything we dream about, 

We can take some steps, few of which I've listed below:

• Test everyone in containment zone: this would help us reach our peak sooner and therefore flatten curve faster.
• Start random testing for Coronavirus: this will go a long way in understanding the community transmission in our country.
• Create demand in the market: this can be done by promoting trade, opening up the economy and other such measures.
• Make public transport safe: this can be done once we've reached our peak cases, which in turn, can be expedited by increasing testing and random tests. Public transport goes a long way into reviving economy, and surely, we wouldn't want to choke ourselves in cars on roads like USA.
• Do NOT permit international travel until it's really safe to do so: we already have our hands full with the cases we've got, we don't need a fresh wave of cases, do we?
• Bail out aviation sector and public transport sector: Aviation has a humongous impact on economy and it will surely help make economic recovery faster. Public transport has been on hold for more than two months now, and they'd have their liquidity issues.

We do not have to scratch our heads and debate about the success of lockdown, primarily because we know the answer, and also because we have to focus on far more important things. We do not need government to brag about the success of their way of handling this situation, nor do we need opposition blaming them for not handling well, because it's in the past now, and past can not be undone.

I believe states play more important role in coming days, as the ball is in their court now. Every move of theirs should be well calculated and well thought after.

Jai Hind

(Thoughts expressed by the author are personal).