I had a small discussion with one of my ex-student on the current ongoing political blame game on the CoVID crisis. As a teacher, it was my obligation to put my critical view on this and set an example of critical thinking and problem-solving skills an engineer and an aspiring leader are expected to have rather than acting as a "chamcha" or "bhakt" of a specific political party during crisis time.
So, what went wrong?
1) The government and the bureaucracy failed in anticipating the severity of the second wave predominantly with a different strain of virus, they failed to learn from the second wave and third wave in the western and European countries.
2) People have become complacent and underestimated the second wave and lacked awareness.
The media completely failed in its responsibility to create awareness about the second wave and did not show the situation of the severity of the second wave in western and European countries to sensitize the Indian public enough.
What is still going wrong?
1) The governments and the bureaucracy in passive mode and not ready to accept accountability and responsibility.
2) Media showing and sensationalizing political party statements and their blame games.
3) Still, large sections of society not taking the CoVID protocols seriously.
4) Fake news and hyper-sensationalized social media creating a sense of fear and panic in society.
What needs to be done?
1) Prioritize the urgent action items considering the situation would go worse in the coming weeks.
2) Have a common central command center at the national, state, and district level to control and monitor CoVID hospitals, ambulances, and medical supplies related to CoVID complications. Engage efficient administrative manpower for an effective and timely response.
3) Engage the police forces and law order machinery to bring discipline, prevent hoarding of CoVID medical supplies, check the fake news spread.
4) The government at the state and district level should assure proper transportation and logistics service is available for oxygen cylinders and medical equipment’s quick mobility. Since the governments do have their own transport and logistics machinery, it should provide financial assurance to the service providers helping the local governments.
5) Increase makeshift CoVID care centers with required medical facilities.
6) Bring a sense of responsibility and awareness among the public to follow CoVID protocols. Media should play a vital role here.
7) Political parties should strictly ask their IT cells and functionaries to avoid blame game on the CoVID crisis.
8) Urgently explore and engage the scientific manpower for alternatives to drugs and medical supplies we are dependent on other countries.
How can we prevent such a crisis in the future?
1) There should be a paradigm shift towards proactiveness by the government and the bureaucracy.
2) They learn from past mistakes and other’s mistakes. No matter which government sits at the helm of affairs and policymaking they should prioritize nation-building, innovations, and technology development. Self-sufficiency should be the paramount focus of policy framing.
3) The governments should focus on revamping and modernizing the health infrastructure especially the scalability aspect considering economically it might not be viable to build jumbo health centers with substandard medical supplies and facilities.
4) Every policy should be drafted for the quick scalability and efficient utilization of resources.
5) Set accountability for the bureaucracy, neither the PM nor CM alone is responsible for everything.
6) People should understand that for a modern developed India they are majority stakeholders. They should know that every citizen’s fundamental duties too are defined in the constitution and it is their obligation to perform those duties.
7) Majorly involve technocrats, engineers, scientists, medical experts in policy matters of health infrastructure, technology development and engineering activities.
8) Avoid policy paralysis at the national, state, and district levels.
The country needs a change not just in the form of government, party leaderships but in the form of public mindset to see the nation as a developed nation in the form of robust health infrastructure, strong STEM education framework, technology, and scientifically enchanted agriculture, self-sufficiency and modern defense capabilities.
Current political systems are only encouraging “chamchas” and “bhakts” to be part of the political system and making it harder for the intellectually motivated hardworking citizens who wish to enter into politics to bring the change. The political parties should change their foundations on which their ideologies are based and shun sway with nepotism and dynastic ruling styles, times have changed since independence, no longer the older value system can support the modern aspirations of a huge Indian population.
We need a Chinese way of discipline in the Indian democratic setup. Unless a hard worker is incentivized over a freebie-loving parasite it is very difficult to bring about the change in the mindset which the public needs at large for developed India.
--Author of this article is a member of the teaching faculty at an engineering college.
