On 24th March Indian PM Narendra Modi on his televised national address at 8:00 PM announced a nation wide lockdown for 21 days which will end on 15th April, people started queuing up at the Grocery stores, medical stores, bakery and other shops and started frenzied buying and stocking up every thing they thought will help them survive the lockdown, this was the Indian Middle class.
For a country of 1.3 billion people where 25% of the population lives below the poverty line, lockdown was the beginning of a nightmare, many of those employed in the unorganised sector and working on daily wedges, lost there jobs immediately, land lords quick to ask them to vacate, they had no other option but to leave for there native villages mostly in Uttar Pradesh and Bihar.
What added to the Misery of these people was the non availability of public transport, tens of thousands flocked the bus depots in the hope of finding a commute, as the lockdown was immediate and involved every thing including public transport, these people had no other option but to walk to there villages hundreds of kilometres away with there families, women and children, old and young, for them COVID 19 is a lesser threat to there survival then the loss of livelihood is.
News channels showed the misery of many of the helpless people, families with women and children walking along the highways and railway tracks, desperately trying to reach the villages they hail from, carrying there kids on there shoulders, with no food and water.
Although Indian PM apologised for the hardship people had to face but is was far from enough.Yes after 15 days of lock down India is far better then many of the developed countries, many lives might have been saved, but for those who don’t care about anything else but an end’s meal, COVID-19 is not the only threat to there lives!
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