The number of positive Coronavirus cases has been quietly creeping up again over the last few days, after being southward-bound for some weeks. The average Indian, though, seems to have decided that the worst is over and is living it up again. This is a disaster just waiting to happen, much as we would like to ignore it

No one likes to be a doomsayer and the harbinger of bad news, but I have decided to take on this redoubtable role for the sake of my fellowmen and for my own well-being. All signals point to the fact that a third wave of the COVID-19 pandemic may be just around the corner, waiting for the right time to bite us in the behind when we expect it the least. And we are certainly expecting the ‘least’, it seems, as most of India behaves as if the crisis is over and moves on with living it up, be it on our streets, hill stations, in pubs, clubs and malls, and inside cinema halls and metro rail networks across the country.

The worst part of the scenario is that as and when the expected third wave hits India, it will make March, April and May of 2020 and the same months in 2021 look like a veritable picnic. It is a travesty that we collectively seem to have decided that a once-in-a-century pandemic has gone as suddenly as it appeared into our lives 18 months back. It is astonishing, scary even, that the authorities continue to twiddle their toes at the virus repeatedly, despite the last year-and-a-half having shown India and the world otherwise.

And when the highly visible authorities do this, people tend to follow – as we witnessed in India’s hill stations and other scenic spots, which had the same gaiety and fervor in June and July as it did in yesteryears, just a few months after a Second Wave left India devastated and made a mockery of the globe’s largest democracy in the eyes of the world.

Irony of shortcomings

The time and efficacy of our responses to this pandemic have been pathetic and glaring, even darkly mirthful. In January and February of 2020, when the world as a whole began reeling under the impact of the pandemic and sinister tales of death and mayhem circulating in an ever-shrinking global digital village, of us decided to ignore all warnings and played truant as public gatherings remained the norm. 

Even after the first wave of COVID-19 and the lockdowns, we shrugged off the horrific and immediate past in which we had witnessed on India’s streets and inside hospitals. We were unbelievably resilient when we chose to quickly forget all the screaming ambulances and death wails that had become a part of our ‘new life’, even as our neighbors wept at the lack of wood to cremate their own, or the paucity of land-banks to bury their beloved.

It is little wonder, then, that when the second wave hit with a ferocity that sent every Indian scurrying for cover, we were caught totally unprepared. People fought and wept for oxygen cylinders, ICU beds and ventilators and bodies started washing up on the banks of our rivers. The literal nail in the country’s coffin of international respectability was that even nations a fraction  of India’s size and stature starting sending oxygen aid to us. Some others went to politicking in the state elections, again raking up the specter of religious sentiments, animosity and hate speeches.

The fracas continues

The mental turgidity lives on. We all witnessed the storming of our resorts and hill stations a few months back, as the average Indian decided that enough was enough and life has to go on. It is a paradox that none of these popular destinations had any COVID-19-related restrictions in place. No vaccination or COVID-negative reports were asked for, social distancing was just now followed or policed and hotels open for business after a year, saw hundreds flocking in where only dozens should have been allowed.

Today, we have an even greater irony. Almost all of India’s tourist-y states and resort destinations now have strict entry restrictions in place, at a time when few are venturing out, having been scared witless by the increasing number of cases and by record mountain-side landslides, in the midst of the wettest monsoon that India has witnessed in decades. Let’s not even talk about the hilarious locking of stable doors after the horses (idiots in this case) have all bolted!

A painful twist in the tail (tale) is that as a country, we are already in an unprecedented economic churn, one that is leaving crores of Indians gasping for financial breath. And the worst may be yet to come, as all capital indicators tell us. 

I am no economist, but…

We have already been through the mental and emotional tumult of this never-before crisis. Scarily enough, we are now headed for the financial implications and its fallout. Over 3 crore of India’s educated employed have lost their livelihoods over the last year, while many more have had to settle for hefty pay-cuts. The Center for Monitoring the Indian Economy (CMIE) has already revealed startling numbers of BPL (Below the Poverty Line) Indians as their figure has increased by 23 crore in the last few months alone. Spending power is at an all-time low, even as consumer confidence and ability sinks to new depths.

It is a recipe for real trouble, one that is likely to make mockery of all the financial jugglery that Indians have had to resort to over the last year to keep home and hearth running. Fuel prices are at historical highs. Banks’ performance is at never-before lows, with NPA (Non-Performing Assets) numbers running into lakhs of crores. In the midst of all this, we have the authorities announcing a Rs 1-lakh-crore package to provide 80 crore Indians with basic food grain. If all this weren’t enough, we have upcoming assembly elections in Uttar Pradesh, which are already taking on dangerous religious and communal overtones.

The need of the hour is a sense of balance and a calm approach to political and policy moves. And certainly, a very clear approach to COVID-19 in its next few avatars. This pandemic is not going away anytime soon – the sooner we accept that reality and act accordingly in a manifested manner, the faster we will be in a position to keep the devil at bay, as far as possible, while still building up the foundations for a resurgent India.

The author is a communications consultant and a clinical analyst