Life in the Days of Coronavirus - Day Zero, March 22

Let's put Day Zero as Sunday, when the Prime Minister announced a Janata Curfew and fervently appealed to the population to stay at home, wash hands frequently, gear up for a bit of hardship and most importantly, observe Janata Curfew on Sunday, March 22, 2020, from 6 am to 9 pm. And to clap and make some noise for 5 minutes at 5 pm for the doctors and medicos and all those on the frontline. Ok, it's some kind of an experiment for the future we thought and geared up for a day. Overall I thought he would say something like what the government foresees as the real problem, what steps it is taking to face it and clear instructions on what the citizens must do. I didn't get too much info on that.

Not a bird moved all of Sunday in our colony. Actually, the birds came out in all their glory. The people stayed home. Silently. We watched some movies as usual, read some and at 5 pm when people around us started clapping we clapped a bit too. Later on, I started receiving some weird forwards about how this clapping etc will send vibrations that will kill the virus or something and it was a brilliant ploy to do that. If that is what it takes, we ought to be clapping day and night since we are all doing nothing much at home anyway. Anyway I saw that the 5 pm clapping soon took on an energy of its own and people started clanging cymbals, one person blew a conch, some crackers went off and overall I realised people thought it was time to celebrate. Next day we saw several videos of people congregating and clapping, defeating the entire purpose and probably just making the jobs of the medicos that much more harder.

The best video I saw that day was shared by Prof Anuradha Jonnalagadda and I'll share it here so it stays with me for posterity. Thanks whoever took the video. Much obliged.

To me, that represented what we are as a nation, as a society. This person, marginalised, probably without any identity, papers, money, religion, caste, creed, clapping shyly, doing his bit for the cause. That to me represented everything, that we are all in it together, whether you are up on your posh bungalow and clapping for the media or whether you have the grandest intention and not really clapping it is not bigger or better than this sincere, shy clapping of one of our own. His contribution is no less than what any one of us are doing, he is existing, he is clapping too. He's one of us and we need to embrace him and make his life easier. I do hope it does become easier for him and millions like him. And even if it doesn't, we feel for you brothers. We feel for you.

This is what we are. Not a fractured society, seeking to show our upmanship based on religion, riches, caste or power. This one clap resounds as loudly as any. If you think you are any different from him, try telling that to the virus.

Thanks Anuradha ma'am for sharing this wonderful video.