US-based political rating firm Morning Consult rated Prime Minister Narendra Modi the most popular world leader last week for his efficient handling of the Covid-19 pandemic. While this should be a moment of pride for all of us, we need to refresh our memory about what he has done to attract such encomiums across the world.
Imagine a family that is saving money on a day-to-day basis to buy lifestyle items but is suddenly faced with a situation where a member falls seriously ill. The family head decides to spend the entire money on getting the ailing member back to health and postpones all major economic decisions. No one in the family grudges that and everybody gets ready to build their dreams again.
This is exactly what happened when Covid-19 struck India in February-March 2020. The country was doing reasonably well and aspiring to become a major economy, despite the economic slowdown the world over. The decision to put the country under lockdown meant that economic activities would virtually shut down. But the decision had to be taken and the country’s leader, like the family elder, Prime Minister Narendra Modi, decided to save lives first.
Nobody knew how to deal with the situation. Nobody knew how the new virus would spread and how it would be contained. World health bodies and experts had differing views on how to deal with the situation. The only reasonable way was to track down the carrier and isolate the patient till he recovered. But this was a near impossible task due to the density of population and the number of people who had already come into India from various affected countries, including China.
Luckily, in India, we had Narendra Modi, who is an expert in disaster management, at the helm. He had organised the biggest relief work in Gujarat while trying to rebuild Bhuj after a devastating earthquake. He did it first as BJP’s organisational man in 2001, then as Chief Minister from 2002, till he became the Prime Minister in 2014.
His experience and instinct, besides feedback from experts, indicated that something serious was going to threaten human existence. Let us not forget that Covid-19 was declared a pandemic much later. One can imagine how civilisations must have collapsed and become extinct in the past. India was clearly not prepared. There was a shortage of PPE Kits, masks, sanitisers, drugs and every other thing that was needed to deal with the situation, including doctors and paramedical staff.
It was in this context that on 24 March 2020, Prime Minister Modi came on national television and announced a nationwide lockdown for 21 days. Prior to the lockdown, US health expert Dr Ramanan Laxminarayan had warned that, in the worst-case scenario, about 60% of India’s population, or 80 crore people, would be infected with Covid-19. But in view of the lockdown, Dr Ramanan scaled down the figure to about 20% (almost 30 crore). There is now a history of how the lockdown was extended and how it was violated and the controversy associated with the events. But, overall, the country behaved very sensibly. The economy shrunk, people lost jobs and life got completely disturbed—but lives were saved.
A comparison would give a clearer picture. As of 2 January 2021, about 8.2 crore people have been infected with Covid-19 worldwide, of which, more than 18 lakh people have succumbed to the disease. Meanwhile, the most powerful country in the world, with one of the best healthcare systems, saw about 2 crores of its 32-crore population become infected with Covid-19 and close to 3.5 lakhs die. Compare this with India, which has a population of about 140 crores. More than 1 crore people were infected and close to 1.5 lakh people died in the country. While the Indian graph is tapering further and bringing hope, the situation elsewhere in the world is not encouraging. Just last Saturday, the United States recorded the highest spike of 2.77 lakh cases in a day.
PM Modi must be credited for deciding that the economy can wait. Like a senior figure in a family, he decided to save the lives of each and every individual. There are many countries that thought they could tackle the crisis differently due to their strong healthcare systems, but failed and saw very high casualty figures. One country even tried to become a predator by buying cheap stocks in the depressed market. But India upheld its morality and showed the human face of its civilisational roots.
From manufacturing PPE kits, masks and sanitizers, creating extra beds and training paramedics on how to handle the situation, it was an onerous task never undertaken on such a huge scale ever before. Normally, in such situations, panic grips people because of the shortage of essential commodities and the uncertainty about events. But the Modi government ensured that the supply line was not disrupted. He appealed to traders and stockists not to hoard and appealed people not to panic. The Indian Railways plied at night to ensure that there were no shortages. Road transport ensured that these reached the right places. Even the supply of milk was never disrupted.
From depositing money directly into the accounts of the poor and the deprived to giving free ration to 80 crore people for eight months, it was a mammoth task that the government achieved with aplomb. In the absence of employment and money, they had nowhere to go. But the society was saved from a situation that could have turned volatile. From the Prime Minister down to every minister and health worker, everyone stressed on boosting immunity, and I have hardly heard anyone not knowing the art of boosting immunity using traditional herbs and medicines.
The lockdowns and the consciousness generated among the people prevented Covid-19 from touching the rural areas. We saw barricades put up by villagers for those coming from outside. By the time the disease touched the fringes of the rural population, Indian farmers had already produced a miracle as if to supplement the efforts of the government. India received a bumper kharif crop, rekindling the hope of a quick economic revival.
We have entered 2021 with the hope that the vaccine will soon be available to take care of critical and priority sections of the population. Unless a mishap happens, it appears that we have been successful in containing the disease. Of course, the entire country deserves praise for acting as one. However, one must not forget the leader who made this happen. And the nation must rise in unison to thank God for giving us a leader who knew what to do. He deserves our salute, irrespective of any world ratings.
The writer is convener of the Media Relations Department of the BJP and represents the party as a spokesperson on television debates. He has authored the most authentic book on the Prime Minister, called ‘Narendra Modi: The Game Changer’. The views expressed are personal.
On 24 March 2020, Prime Minister Narendra Modi came on national television and announced a nationwide lockdown for 21 days. Prior to the lockdown, US health expert Dr Ramanan Laxminarayan had warned that, in the worst-case scenario, about 60% of India’s population, or 80 crore people, would be infected with Covid-19.