Tariq Ahmad Dar
The exponential rise in the number of infected cases as well as the steep increase in the number of Covid-19 related deaths and the government’s new protocol for the extended period of lockdown have further added to the already existing panic and will further push India into more severe humanitarian crisis. The present scenario and the stringent containment measures will further deepen the already existing hunger crisis across the country. As the global community is struggling to bring out a possible bio-medical vaccine for SARS-COV-2/Covid-19, therefore, the World Health Organization (W.H.O) has declared ‘social distancing’ the only possible weapon in order to arrest, minimize and prevent the further spread of infection. In response to this, the health minister of India, in his recent interview referred the ‘social distancing’ as ‘social vaccine’, stressing upon the need to follow containment measures in order to bring down the chances of getting infected with the virus. With India being the second most populous country in the world; India faces the enormous challenge in terms of practicing social distancing measures. Lock down in India represents a massive logistical and implementation challenges given the population size and its density. At some places like Mumbai’s Dharavi area where population density is around 66,000 per square km, practicing social distancing becomes the most difficult job. Well, the debatable question that strikes our mind is how difficult it becomes to practice the norms of social distancing when you are deprived of social security?Practicing social distancing; this is hardly viable for 2% of the global population who are homeless or 20% of the global population who lack adequate housing. In India alone, as stated by the global homelessness statistics, there are an estimated 1.8 million homeless people in India, with 52% based in urban areas. A further 73 million families lack access to decent housing (IGH, 2018; Habitat, 2019). In 2017, government authorities demolished 53,700 homes, evicting 260,000 people for reasons such as slum-free; ‘city bifurcation’ projects, despite the government’s ‘housing for all-2022 scheme (HLRN, 2018). Nearly 2.5 million people were displaced through natural disasters and violence in 2018 (internal displacement, 2019). What about the 163 million people India who don’t have access to clean water as reported by The ‘Water Aid’, a global advocacy group on water and sanitation?, these 163 million account for 19% of world’s people without access to clean water. The 2019 report on Global Hunger Index which ranked India at 102 out of 117 countries, well behind its neighboring countries like Nepal, Pakistan and Bangladesh, clearly gives us the picture of humanitarian crisis India is going to face as the report termed the hunger level in India as ‘serious’. So, the overarching objective of the government should be to minimize these severe hunger crises faced by the bottom most section of population and in turn assure them of the food security guaranteed under various articles (Art 39A and Art 47) of the constitution of India.
Alleviating the gap between privileged and the non privileged is prerequisite for the arrival of social stability.
The Coercive measures fall heavily on the poor and the needy, and the government’s strategy for containment is further pushing millions of people into corner. There are an estimated 40 million inter-state migrant workers within India and most of them constitute the daily wage laborers. The humanitarian crisis that sparked across the country clearly shows that India’s preparedness was fishy, doubtful, and suspicious. The desperate and the hungry migrant workers stuck at various shelter homes with no proper sanitation, hygiene, and access to basic health care facilities across the country, have no money in their pockets to spend and no food in their hands to feed their young children, lactating women and elderly parents. Do we have any estimate of how many lives have been lost in same period due to hunger, malnutrition, and lack of access to quality health care? Ignoring the needs, demands, and aspirations of the most downtrodden and marginalized section of people would definitely have disastrous, severe and devastating consequences on the social and economic wheels of India. Nearly 81% of the employed in India are in the informal sector, (I.L.O), therefore, no estimation of the kind of trauma one will face after job losses, or seeing loved ones without food. So after knowing this entire scenario, we should definitely try to find the possible way out. As many suggest that the government is left with two options, one, to choose livelihood and the second is, choosing lives. Instead of choosing one among the two, government should try to address both, saving lives as well as providing livelihood in the form of monetary assistance to the section of people facing the financial stress. There is a desperate need of assistance for those who have suffered the maximum burnt of nationwide lock down including farmers, farm workers, daily workers, unemployed, unorganized sector, rural poor and small entrepreneurs. Economists have suggested various possible solutions; India has invested $480 billion abroad, monetizing one-tenth of the amount would be about 3.2 lakh Cr. Only. RBI has 9.6 lakh crore reserves meant for financial emergencies, monetizing one-third of the amount would be about 3.2 lakh crores only. The extra supply of food is needed in order to fulfill the surpassing demands across the country. Right now India has 8.5 lakh tons of Dal, 30 lakh tons of Sugar that needs to mobilized now. In fact, Art. 39(A) of the constitution of India requests the state to direct its policies so that every citizen has a right to an adequate means of livelihood. Article 47 that reads, duty of state to raise the level of nutrition and the standard of living and to improve the public health. Moreover, beds, sanitizers, drinking water, cooked meals etc should be made available at all isolation facilities across the country in the form of Standard operation Procedure. Since there is a shortage of police personnel, the self help groups in engagement with the district administration can be motivated for surveillance round the clock-community policing. The administration should take prompt actions and measures on humanitarian basis in order to reduce the atrocities felt by laborers across the country. There should be a monetary assistance for the farmers who have already suffered big losses amid the nationwide lockdown. The government needs to take strict and proactive measures to curb the atrocities on the needy and destitute and should underscore and emphasize on their security which is elementary and fundamental to them.
(The author is pursuing B.SC (HONS) Chemistry at AMU Aligarh. Views are his own, [email protected])