Corona Virus Part 6, Free Advices, Stronger Nation and Supporting China

             I am contributing my small part in this lockdown period through on the ground deeds and writing the weekly blog posts. The helping hands, in the form of seva on the ground and writing fingers, in the form of writing blog posts, together produce a lot of contribution from my side. One can wonder how I can concretely contribute through writing articles. But, to the contrary, my last blog post came at an opportune time in providing an advice to the government to extend the lockdown. My timing is great yet again and I hit a sixer out of the park with minimum effort. Giving valuable advice to some entity at a right moment of their need is nothing short of an invaluable deed. I manufactured myself into the shoes of an advisory person and the government, heeding my advice, promptly extended the lockdown by few more weeks. It might be just coincidental but when different forces act in coherence unanimously, then the outcome will be a correct decision rather than skeptics pegging something against it. As mentioned, I donned yet another role of that an advisory counsel and will be of more help to anyone who seek my invaluable advices without paying any fee. Like I am writing these posts for free without expecting a single penny. In U.S. it might be called as a deal or settlement, in India it might be called as a service fee but I call it free since I am in the mission of betterment of humanity.

             There are many moments of brilliance in my daily day-to-day life and I capture some of them to provide tokens of inspiration to one and all. The above moment of brilliance came last week, and I am writing about it so that it does not go unnoticed. With that, I request one and all to rise above the circumstances and contribute your part to the society rather than waiting for somebody to help you. Everyone should ask a few questions to one-self and get an honest answer – what is my contribution in this moment of need? Am I a giver or receiver? How well am I reacting to the moments of inspiration from persons like me? All my life, I received help from some external person, but I raised above those days, became self-sufficient and helping others in need. You need to be a strong person yourself and avoid getting help from a second person. When these strengths at individual level are collectively considered, it makes our nation stronger. Personally, I became stronger and when you extrapolate it over the residing nation, you get similar results. Covid19 is a great opportunity to create a stronger nation where majority give and very few receive. Many people should pitch in with charity and charity should reach the last person. Think about the owners of houses who waived-off the rent of tenants, management of companies who paid the staff - salaries during lockdown, generous people who donated money for those who lost their livelihood, who donated food etc. – we need many individuals contributing to the cause which will make the lockdown a boon rather than a bane. In such a scenario alone, will we neutralize the bad effects of lockdown on every suffering person and make the country stronger.

             One of the countries suffering due to this virus outbreak is China. The country has been in the ire of several western nations for no fault of its own. True, the virus originated in the country, but it is not a reason worthy enough to go against it. Mistakes happen and unknown diseases, viruses originate every now and then from different locations, but they should not elicit blame games from other countries. The European nations and the U.S. which have failed hugely in containing the spread of virus, wants someone to be blamed for their present bad shape. I thoroughly condemn this finger pointing at other country when they themselves are to be blamed for the pandemic in their respective countries. Nonetheless, the image of China has been dented after the spread of virus to more than 200 countries and the impact on global supply chains due to non-production or non-export from China since the past few months.

            This does not mean that companies should look down upon China and set up shop elsewhere. India or any other country should not consider it as their gain when someone else is reeling in pain. Countries should shed their opportunistic mindset of gaining from other country’s loss. We are all in this pandemic together and we will emerge victorious together without hurting any country in the process. The world should stand in solidarity and for one another in this moment of grief without making opportunistic insinuations. The foreign factories who are looking at other locations outside China should not base their decision on this virus pandemic alone. Deliberations such as these and ensuing location shifts will add insult to the injury and does no good to the world’s second largest economy which is already sagging from the recent developments. In the interests of world and China, the status-quo must be continued without any drastic measures and help in restoring the economy which shrank by about 6.8% in the last quarter - the largest such decline since quarterly GDP is introduced in 1992. It is time for economic think-tanks to ponder over how to rise the economy rather than shifting factories and aggravate the problem further. I vouch on my mobile phone that I stand in full support in protecting the interests of China at their hour of need.

             Moving on to the global coronavirus statistics, there are a total 39.09 lakh confirmed cases, 2.70 lakh deceased. In the past week, 6 lakh new cases came up and 35 thousand passed away. Every week 6 lakh new cases have been recorded for some time now. However, the peak has already reached, and the journey moved on to the downward slope. By being responsible and practicing all the good norms of lockdown times, these 6 lakh new cases a week can be brought to one-lakh and from there to zero. But in India, the number of new cases has started to rise steeply in the past week with an average daily addition of 2735 new cases. This means 19,145 new cases have been registered in the past week with a 50% rise over the total tally. Confirmed cases did not swell by this margin till date in a week as thousands of new cases are being popped up every day. This should ring alarm bells in the administration which should take this tally seriously and should develop methods to contain it. When the numbers are swelling, restrictions are being lifted in many places which needs to be looked upon if the strategy is correct or not. I will go for restrictions to remain in place for 50-60 days before easing them a bit.

             At the time when numbers are increasing sharply, one of the strategies which requires backlash is the decision to sell liquor in the wine shops. I thought India is doing diligent duties in the aftermath of virus pandemic but where from these crazy ideas come from. What is the necessity to open liquor shops when people don’t have money to buy food? On the first day of sale few days back, people thronged the shops like the wine shops are selling vaccine to corona, flouting all social distancing norms and waiting in lengthy queues to buy liquor brand corona. People will not buy if the shops are shut but opening the shops and charging higher price is a drastic step which will evaporate any savings an ordinary addict might have made. People’s wealth and their good health is paramount during these times but you are putting both in jeopardy by spurring them to buy liquor and damaging immunity, health and wealth of the nation. Moreover, these shops are opened in metros as well which are having ever increasing number of cases. If the plan is for revenue from sales, then there is nothing lower one can stoop. For any reason, this is done in very bad taste. Lockdown is a good reason to keep people away from liquor and these shops should be locked for at least one more month.