Corona times 2020........25. Us, senior citizens, look back and rue the missed opportunities.

We golfing friends have a whatsApp group and we chat on a variety of subjects.. Sometimes it gets serious!

I posted charts which showed; "Just five large cities had 35% of the cases and a mortality of 44% of the total for India. And top ten states accounted for 84% of cases and 92% of deaths."  We also see that the Covid 19 is spreading further into more states. However slowly. When we look at the world numbers, we are 3rd ranked in the number of cases! 

Clearly, the time we bought at a huge cost, by locking down, appears to be totally inadequate to prepare for this Covid 19 onslaught. Especially for taking care of the patients, with adequate facilities, a clear cut system and even enough number of doctors!  

Bala agreed and a story he added gives a different perspective:
"True and most decisions made by our establishments are never well thought through. Sudden decisions!" 

He was reminded of a story: "25 years ago, an Indonesian crew member told me about a “hors d’oeuvre” dish (I call it dogs d’oeuvre), narrated below and my interpretation is in parentheses"

"A really healthy dog (Read, a prosperous India) is, suddenly, tied up and kept starved for weeks on end (Read, tied by white British Raj pre-1947 to brown British Raj post 1947). The dog is now stir crazy for food and raving mad (Read, Indians, frustrated with a state of economic darkness while countries in the neighborhood like Singapore, Malaysia, Thailand, Indonesia and even ‘pre-LTTE Sri Lanka’ flourished)."

"And then, suddenly, present a bucket of raw rice to the dog (Read, economic liberalization post PV Narasimha Rao’s era when flood gates have been opened for economy). The crazy hungry dog will start eating but can never stop (Read, all the material goodies suddenly presented, the consumer durables and non-durables)."

"The dog eats till it collapses and dies of exhaustion (Read, our choked roads and urban areas congested with concrete ghettos). Disgusting as it sounds, the dog’s stomach with the rice is removed, tied at both ends, cooked and eaten (Read, will all the FDIs eat us up? Is the writing on the wall?) Or, has COVID come to our rescue?"

I reacted: "Exactly my thoughts. I had even started a blog and didn’t complete."

Ramdas joined with "This relates to influence of British rule and it's effect post 1947.
How were we as a people regarding discipline prior to British rule through the ages?
We do have examples of many admirably disciplined persons but no idea of discipline of the people as a whole." And added, "The fact that there were about 500 Rulers -  says a lot about helpless masses."

Bala replied: "We may have to go back several hundred years, to times before Islamic invasions or even prior to Alexander."  And pointed out, "Not much has changed currently. We have about the same numbers in the Parliament  "

The comments by Ramdas and the rejoinder by Bala hits the nail on the head. People at the helm had no worries earlier with increases in Population. With their feudal mentality, they didn't care . The same attitude has persisted post 1947. I do not think there will be any hope, if this attitude persists. The dreamers will dream on for better days for the downtrodden, and it will remain just a dream! It is imperative we address this increase in population.

From this perspective, it is really a moot whether Covid has come to rescue us.  The high number of migrant workers and their exploitation was due to the unbridled growth of our population! In the last 30 years India added another 500 million people to it's population. It is even more than the population of India at the time our independence. Experts termed it as "Demographic dividend!" Is it payback time for us for having let the population grow without any serious efforts to control its' growth?

It is also said that the  Top 10% of our population own 74% of the country's wealth! How did this has happen? Nehru's dream of a socialistic pattern of society vanished? Being liberalized does not mean becoming rich at the cost of the poor! We were treated as country of coolies before and it is clear we have now managed to add one more India of coolies with our policies and negligence. A vote bank politics?  

The leaders of the country and the leaders of the industry and so on, need to introspect and come out with better plans from now on . It will not be achieved by exchanging abuses and being hypocritical and putting labels on whatever suggestion is made.  If we do not do it right, as the tasks are huge, it will be one more opportunity lost! It needs the kind of discipline both Germany and Japan showed to come out literally from the ashes!