CHANDER SHARMA
As the we enter the last week of rigorous lockdown, we are really anxious to know whether it will be lifted after expiry of 21-days or extended further? The lockdown was enforced on 24 March to fight the deadly coronavirus. The lockdown has totally shut all the economic activities, closing its businesses as all air, road and rail transport were suspended. With the stay-at-home orders, 1.3 billion Indian were locked inside their houses.
While the loss to $2.9 trillion India’s economy will be colossal, the lockdown hasn’t served fully the very purpose it was intended. As on April 9, the death toll due stood at 166 and the number of cases at 5,734 in the country , according to the Union Health Ministry.
While the number of active COVID-19 cases is 5,095, as many as 472 people were cured and discharged and one had migrated, it said.
According to experts, India is still at an early stage of the infection. Unfortunately, we still don’t have adequate data on the transmissibility of the virus. We don’t know how many people have been infected. So, a harsh lockdown can, surely, slow down the spread of disease.
Latest reports say More than 250 of 700-odd districts have reported the infection. The government on Sunday sealed 75 districts in the country to combat the threat of novel coronavirus. Reports say at least seven states have a third of all infections, and want the lockdown extended. There are six states from the Delhi in the north to Maharashtra in the west and Tamil Nadu in the south, having clusters of rapidly growing infections.
The current situation warrants several rounds of “suppress and lift” cycles. During these periods “restrictions are applied and relaxed, applied again and relaxed again. These ivities.meeasures are required to keep the pandemic under control and at the same time accelerate some economic activities. No country can afford to suppress economic activities for long.
So India is at a stage where country need shutdowns until transmission of virus slows down markedly, and some economic activities to keep that country moves on. Even during lockdown, people need goods and services to sustain.
In view of the given situation, govt can go for a “lift and suppress” cycles.Govt can extend lockdown in hotspots but lift from others as to run some economic activities.
