So much gone with thief, so much to find the thief….war against Cornoa has already defeated poor and middle income

How should an Indian be in the modern India that is ruled by Modi; be rich or poor or be a middle income person? 

Rich will have lots of problem in India because they have to pay super rich tax, their conscience will be ploughed regularly to do charity and always tax authorities shall remain as third eye to book them for some tax evasion cases.   

Middle income, especially the tax paying middle income are the most succulent fruit for any government in the centre to juice maximum by way of new taxation, cess and the possible inflation of various essential commodities due to all wrong politics and programmes of the government. 

The poor are although celebrated by every political party during election season are the most neglected lot in our country.  In a sense, the poor shall remain as poor to get remembered again by our politician during next election season.  So far no one had done anything great to the poor people and middle income and simultaneously the poor people were also not harmed by our system. 

The 21 day lock down has killed the lively-hood of everyone and the loss is always in proportion to their income.   Many poor and middle income groups working in private firms have lost everything thanks to the unplanned, horribly announced 21 day lock down to combat corona. 

The question is not about the measures or its inevitability but how it should have been done considering the diversity and unimaginable social and economic structure of Indian population.  Like demonetization or unplanned implementation of GST can be forgiven because they were political in nature and Modi has understood the political implication of the above decisions and harvested also richly in 2019 election. 

The 21 day lock down of India to combat Corona appears to have done more harm to India than any great benefit.  The consequence of the lock down may take at least 25 years to repair because the definite side effects of the lock down are incalculable. 

Job loss, business loss, salary loss, inflation, steep increase in family budget, shortage of resources, increased disease burden to depression, increased medical bill etc. 

Who would save the poor and middle income from the perennial grief due to lock down? 

Either way people see the lock down and corona epidemic like I toss the coin, if head means government wins and if tail comes, the poor and middle income group stands to lose.  Either way people have to face the catastrophe. 

Either die of Corona or die due to loss of lively hood.  

Government had enough time but gave just 4 hours to people to accept the imposition of the lock down. 

Government and those likely to have advised the government from the medical and other allied fraternity completely missed to note the ground reality but went ahead with US or European recipe to deal the problem. 

If the government had applied its political mind, probably the government would have taken such decision and such decision would have taken only after wiser planning and preparedness.   Many epidemic diseases in the past India has surpassed under congress regime. 

The moral of the story is that whether you are rich or poor or middle income group, Modi will not spare you and what matters is only own image, the title of decisive and firm leader who is bold and brave.  To achieve the above goal, people will be asked to make sacrifices and if necessary even jump into the Agnikund (fire pit) and such action would interpreted as an effort for eternal salvation.  

One may argue how India can deal such situation other than by imposing 3 week lock down?  Our health care system and medical thinking are highly westernized; therefore we are always tempted by nothing but western recipe.  

Time has come; we must evolve Indian-ized methods and must balance both the goal as well as how to minimize the suffering of poor and middle income group.  Just to prove our bravery or to claim internationals appreciation, we should not kill the livelihood of millions and millions of people.  

We also must ask our health ministry officials and the so called westernized medical fraternity about why until now we could not eliminate many neglected third world diseases like Dengue, Chikungunya, Typhoid, Malaria, Cholera, worm and parasitic infestations etc.  If we have had adequate plan and programme in place, the impact of Corona we could have minimized and also the associated human suffering due to the foresight-less measure called lock down.   

Even at village level when someone get chickenpox, the members of the family go for self-quarantine and would keep neem leaf in front of the house to indicate other members of the village to avoid the house.  It means people already knew of the essence of self-quarantine since time immemorial.  Recently they have defied the lock down only because of their miserable helplessness for which we must squarely blame the government of India. 

In Modiland, people suffer the worst more from the lock down than from corona. 

S Ranganathan