Introduction:
The year 2020 will make for an epic year in History marking the uproar and mayhem in the normal life of ordinary people. The pandemic has not only limited itself to morbidity and mortality but has also staged for intense debates extending to social, economic, cultural and most importantly political realms. While the mortality rates keep pouring like rain and we as a citizen of the country have many questions to ask. “What is the government doing?” “Has any political dynamics changed”? “Are people’s rights being protected?” The pandemic has highlighted faulty national healthcare facilities and sketchy division in global and national politics.
Well, the pandemic is here and both the public health experts and government agencies sang of calamitous warnings about the likelihood. Uprising debates on plunging globalism versus citizenship and government in power versus experts. Global leaders are intimidated and this fact is distracting them from the global response to curb the virus.
The bottom of a socio-economic hierarchy has been hit hard. The tally of mortality is being dug in the grave with the help of data’s of new recoveries and cases. Concern towards global initiatives to trace and detect cases, funding on the research for vaccines and cures and balance in the travelling and trade should be the concern of time. We are failing to initiate such a programme due to lack of political agendas.
The deaths could have been averted if India’s political design had encouraged cooperation and trust in society rather than endorsing rivalry and rapacious relation.
Period of Crisis- Is Government Paying Attention?
Inefficiency of the government comes into radar for their failing aptitude to observe the rights of citizens towards understanding the right to health as a part of the right to life. Instead, the government chose to deflate rights in the name of the economy. More lives could be granted if the current growth focused on the economy was diverted into the direction of people and their life.
The fanatical quest of growth has set apart a large section of the informal, insecure working class of circular migrants whose day to day life dependent on a daily wage. The marginal class of people faced the threat of life more than anyone else around the world. They stand orphaned by the rule of law and injustice is being served to them. The government holds its liability to these people as they also make for a major section in the country. They have been absorbed and unmoored into the urban economy. Prime minister gave a call to clap honk, bang plates and ring bells etc to acknowledge the contribution of doctors as frontline warriors whereas on the real side they were not given basic protection. The anxiety of the doctors and medical staff infecting their own families were valid.
The most affected informal workers in urban areas are the distressed migrants who are drawn out of a crisis-ridden rural economy in search of survival opportunities. They faced cost-cutting by employers in an effort to crop the market risk by the misbalance in business. It’s high time for the government to change their agendas and focus on the merciful situation of this class of people. The migrants from different states were pushed out due to lack of government initiative to provide them with a basic livelihood. The media coverage of people walking kilometres to go back to their natives, a woman delivering her child on road, vendors committing suicide and here and there unregistered cases have triggered our belief on the government.
Distress of the Daily-Wage Workers and Migrants
Just before the 21-day lockdown on the night of March 24, the Ministry of Labor advised the employer to not cut slack to the wages for the workers to absorb the shock of the lockdown. There was no legal enforcement to it; no social protection was upheld for the millions of workers (estimated to be 25 million to 50 million). The government failed to calculate the basic needs such as rental costs and food securities thus leading to major exploitation by the employers. The estimated number of migrants struck was around 10 crores. Thousands of migrant workers headed home, and many more were on their way. They were promised all means of livelihood through various schemes including MNREGA. This scheme has also been a bone of contention between the ruling party and the opposition party.
There was not a single provision for transportation sanctioned for the migrants to travel back home. The migrants slept on roads while some got crushed by vehicles. Due to the unrest situation of poverty on not being paid for their labour caused a few of them to take their own life.
A mere paper by the government asking the employer to pay a suffix amount to the labourers didn’t do enough. When the crisis hit the road, the government stood answerable to the Supreme Court. The government went ahead charging the media for wrong broadcasting. The government had quite clearly mistaken in not assuming the approaching migrant crisis.
Economic Policy- The Government Card
The Reserve Bank of India lowered its repo rate by 0.75% to 4.4% on March 27, 2020. It lowered the reverse repo rate on 17th April by 0.25% to 3.75%. It was followed with another cut off to both rates by 0.4% in May 2020. The bank launched “targeted long term repo operation”- (TLTRO) which will allow repurchase agreements on investment-grade bonds, commercial paper and another debt instrument – non-convertible debentures.
The RBI allowed all banks to allow three months deferments of payment for loans on March 27, 2020. The government announced a plan on March 26, 2020, to help the nation to cope up with the economic crisis during this pandemic. It included free grain and other staples for poor families, expanded insurance for health workers, cooking gas to the women in rural areas, one-time payment of $13.31 to 30 million senior citizens and construction workers.
The “Self-Reliant India” packages released by the PM on May 13 were divided into 5 slots. The first focused on small and medium-sized business and trade. Extension of full and partial loans was guaranteed including the extension in various tax filing deadlines and payroll tax deductions. The second provision dealt with the below poverty mass, migrants and farmers. It extended credit to farmers, provided food for migrant workers and made minimum wage law apply more uniformly. The third realm was agriculture and funding of farm supply and infrastructure reform. The fourth focused on loosening regulations in the coal and mineral sector and increase private-sector association, changing military regulations, reduction airline prices and the privatization of power utilities. The fifth reform focuses on business reforms, increasing funding for various rural programs.
On June 12, 2020, the government halved the interest taxpayers on GST for the months of February, March and April.
Tablighi Jamaat: A Communal Distraction?
While the migrant’s evacuation was becoming a failure, the news of Tablighi Jamaat’s international congregation at the Markaz Mosque in Nizammudin spread like fire. The media definitely didn’t step a foot back from flashing it on every social platform. The images of migrants walking miles which involved pregnant women and infants were replaced by alternative imagers. Images of Muslim youths licking spoons, spitting on foods and bystanders were all over the news. The congregation transformed into a conspiracy to spread the virus. The Tablighi participants did breach the norms of lockdown. Union Government claimed not to be aware of so many foreign participants to come into the country. The government’s denial was contradicting in many ways. Why was no screening done at airports? Why wasn’t the government aware of such mass meets?
The media screamed on the spread being done by the Nizamuddin incident, and that it caused for half the total number of COVID 19 cases. Although all the Tablighi attendees were identified and sent to the quarantine period, the cases kept rising in different parts of the state thus questioning the validity of blaming the Jamaat as a source of the spread. Who to blame for the exponential curve? No community, no group is to be blamed, a country with a large young population and its workers surviving in miserable and unhygienic conditions is the cause. Sustaining the correct issue was far-reaching. Communal indifference didn’t stop to show up even during this pandemic.
Unemployment- A Cry for help!
Under The Employee Provident Fund Organization whichever employee contributes to EPF can withdraw up to 75% of the account balance or a basic salary or dearness allowance whichever is lower. The government will pay provident fund contribution to both employer and employee where the employment is up to 100 and 90% of them earn up to Rs 15,000/ month. Extension to due date by EPFO for the payment of contribution for wage month of March 2020 from 15 April 2020 to 15 May 2020 has been made. Members of provident funds will be granted non-refundable advances. No penal charges where to be levied for any delay in the payment of any contributions or administrative charges during the lockdown. Pension fund Regulatory and Development Authority allowed partial withdrawals from the NPS to fulfil the monetary need for the treatment of COVID illness. Instead of all the allowances and remedies, our country is yet not ready to cope up with the random sack of employees, especially in the private sectors. The domains have been sacking employees each day to secure their economy turbulence and have successfully rooted out many youngsters as well as old employees’.
Transparency of PM Fund
The Fund website claimed that Rs. 2000 crore was spent for supplying 50,000 ventilators to government hospitals. It also claimed for distribution of Rs 1000 crore to state governments to assist migrant labourers and Rs 100 crore to support Covid-19 vaccine development efforts. The RTI queries failed to verify the money spent for the assistance to migrant labourers. The question was also on the 25 vaccine development initiatives taken by the PM-CARES fund support.
The Supreme Court struck down a petition asking the money from the PM Fund to be transferred to the National Disaster Response Fund to finance the relief work. Law minister Ravi Shankar Prasad hit back at the opposition demanding accountability of the fund as “transparency was writ large” and it was legitimate for the PM to not indulge in any queries as any information could be used by the oppositions to delegitimize those in power.
While the BJP government focused on two scams of the previous government- Commonwealth Games and 2G spectrum, it failed to shed light on PM Fund.
Step Towards The Good
The government might have been called down at several points but they did make some efforts in getting the situation back on track.
- Oil ministry announced eight free refills in three months for households using 5kg cooking gas cylinders.
- Introduced Aarogya Setu application to get the citizens aware of the virus.
- The finance minister under its PM-KISAN scheme awarded a benefit of 6 crore farmers with a down payment of Rs 13,855 crore towards the first instalment of PM-KISAN.
- Aid to construction workers was provided worth Rs 3,066 under the scheme of Building and Construction Worker’s Fund.
- An amount of Rs 1,400 crore was distributed to about 2.82 crore old age people, widows and disabled people under the National Social Assistance Programme.
- Health workers were provided with a health insurance cover of Rs. 50 lakh per person.
- “YUKTI” a web portal was introduced to combat Covid-19. The government under its Ujjawala scheme would provide LPG refills for the poor women.
- Hike in wage from Rs 182 to Rs 202 was processed under the MGNREGA programme.
- Women under Jan Dhan accounts received Rs. 500 each in their account.
- The deadline to file a GST return was extended to June 30, 2020.
- Deadline for linking Aadhaar with PAN card has been extended from March 31 to June 30, 2020.
Conclusion
With so many debates, criticism and doubts we have made this COVID situation as a part of our life. The right to health and livelihood should be the primary focus of the Government. The Government cannot be blamed or criticized solely on some mere assumptions. The Government is trying and we also have to try. Loopholes are the result of every action digging into the same won’t help rather we need to cooperate with the schemes and norms of the government. In this situation, we need to support each other and prevent the pandemic from taking a toll on us economically and physically. Focus towards development policy and towards a people-centric shared and collective global progress to avert such disasters in future.
References:
- https://www.thehinducentre.com/the-arena/current-issues/article31336498.ece
- https://dnyuz.com/2020/09/14/lack-of-transparency-over-modis-covid-19-relief-fund-hurts-indian-democracy/
- https://www.sc.com/en/feature/the-political-implications-of-covid-19/
- https://www.investopedia.com/government-stimulus-efforts-to-fight-the-covid-19-crisis-4799723
- https://www.hindustantimes.com/india-news/20-days-20-steps-a-look-at-government-s-measures-against-covid-19-amid-lockdown/story-aUNOgQ9Om2dxQt9WAyEaGI.html
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