An open letter to the President of India

[Sukla Sen]

Dear Friend/s,

 

Please find below a self-explanatory open letter - proposed to be sent, to the President of India.

 

Please endorse, with your full name, affiliation/designation (if any) and location indicated.

 

The endorsement may be sent to sengau...@gmail.com.

 

Gautam Sen

Arvind Ghosh

Sukla Sen

 

 

To

The President of India,

Rashtrapati Bhavan,

New Delhi - 110004.

<presiden...@rb.nic.in>

 

 

Subject: The Desperate Plight of the Migrant Workers in the wake of COVID-19 Lockdown and Dire Need for Immediate Remedial Intervention

 

Respected Sir,

 

We, the udersigned, have come to learn via reports by various news media outlets, and other sources, that hundreds of thousands of migrant workers have, in the wake of the sudden enforcing of the nationwide lockdown, been desperately trying to return to their homes from their places of work and too many are stuck up in different states of India in extremely miserable conditions, without food and shelter.

Many more perhaps remain stuck up where they had already been, in broadly similar situations.
With the utterly menacing COVID-19 pandemic as the backdrop, this has given rise to a frightening scenario.
Reports have already appeared as regards tens of deaths out of hunger and exhaustion, and even road accident.

We, therefore, respectfully put forward the demand that these workers be treated with dignity and provided with food and adequate shelter wherever they are.
As per official claims, such arrangements have already been made.
But, reports from grounds underline the severe inadequacy of and large gaps in such arrangements, despite various grassroots and civil society organisations coming forward and playing even larger roles than the official machineries in a number of states.

Under the given circumstances, we recognise that it is the obligation of the respective state governments, duly backed up by the Central government, to provide for food, water, soap, medicine etc. and adequate shelters with toilet facilities - where the norms of physical distancing can be realistically followed, for the stuck up migrant workers.

We, therefore, further demand that each state government must, immediately, set up monitoring committees comprised of both official members, entrusted with the task of looking after, and members from the civil society organisations already engaged in relief work or with issues concerning migrant workers.
Various government and private buildings, as required, may be temporarily taken over for this purpose.
If necessary, temporary shelters must, additionally, be built.

 

We also demand that the families of these workers who are left behind in their home states must also be adequately taken care of, overseen by appropriate monitoring committees - constituted on the lines as sketched out above.

The same should, with necessary modifications, apply also to those who have, somehow, been able to reach back home but have, now, no means of livelihood.

 

These arrangements must continue till normalcy is restored.

 

This is required just not to save the lives of these toiling people, who used to meaningfully contribute to the running of the national economy till the very other day, but also to ensure success in halting or, at least, significantly slow down the constantly accelerating spread of the dreaded disease so that the healthcare infrastructure in place does not get overwhelmed and, thereby, a huge catastrophe is averted.

 

We, hereby, humbly request you to personally look into the matter and suitably advise both the Central government and the state governments so that these measures are implemented at the soonest.

 

Sincerely your

[Xavier William]

Malthus doctrine is perhaps the most important doctrine that influences our lives though it does not seem to have received the credit it deserves. According to the doctrine "Population outgrows means of sustenance." This means there will always be scarcity of food and the struggle for it. The most important form of this struggle is violence. Another form of the struggle is evolution - evading competition by mutation.

Malthus doctrine also applies to our daily life.

Thus our expenses always outstrip our income. This holds good for individuals as well as for organizations including governments. In spite of the huge amounts involved government's incomes are still limited even in normal times. Now with the pandemic, like the individuals, governments are also going through abnormal times with shrinking incomes and an uncertain future. This means that the govt has very limited options. Consequently, applications for help to authorities are in likely to fall on deaf ears. I think that under these conditions only neighbors and NGOs can lend a helping hand to those in need as we see in Kerala now. As Kennedy said "Do not ask what the country can do for. Instead ask what you can do for the country!" - Xavier William

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"All new ideas good or bad, great or small start with a one-man minority" - anonymous

A man without god is a man. A God without man is nothing!!

The greatest knowledge is the knowledge that there is so much more to know and the greatest discovery is the discovery that there is so much more to discover

[Sukla Sen]

Resurrecting the ghost of Malthus.

When did he die? How long back???

Any sensible person would acknowledge that the critical issue is *not* the number per se.

It's the (too much) overconsumption by some.

The ecological footprints of humans are too asymmetrically distributed - across class and, also, geography.  

In Kerala all credible accounts point to the stellar role played by the state government (e.g.: <https://www.theweek.in/news/india/2020/04/13/kerala-covid-19-response-puts-so-called-first-world-to-shame-british-economist.html>).

That doesn't, of course, stop sundry individuals spinning their own stories. 

Sukla 

To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/sacred-illusions/CAJ%3DgNFwLLnhg3Q8wQ1FJshEgivmcrk0XmXN2bNJfP5JvmDjsfA%40mail.gmail.com.

[Sukla Sen]

Here's a fairly detailed account of the Kerala model of fighting the COVID-19:

<https://www.technologyreview.com/2020/04/13/999313/kerala-fight-covid-19-india-coronavirus/>.

Sukla