COVID-19 Second Wave: India Continue To Reel Under A Spell Of Death And Disease!

It has been the most horribly painful and depressing week of my life. There has been the spectre of death and unimaginable sufferings of fellow countrymen across India, from which you cannot turn away; reports are there in all news channels, something even the decidedly pro-government media cannot but report, reports and personal accounts across all social media platforms, the dread of the sudden telephone calls and so on. I am reminded of the horrors suffered by Italy and Spain last year, and shiver to imagine a full repetition in a vast and densely populated country like India; the saving grace so far being that the fatality rate here is fortunately still much lower than witnessed in Italy, Spain and other European countries; but even then, in terms of population the Indian numbers in infections and deaths are numbing, and the mutants are more lethal taking toll equally on the young and the old.      

 

The heart wrenching scenes are everywhere to behold: people crowding the hospitals for admission and on being denied forced to lie down on the streets/pavements/corridors and dying there due to lack of oxygen and medical treatment; patients dying in ambulances after waiting hours for admission and an oxygen cylinder; people dying in many hospitals, mostly in the national capital Delhi and Uttar Pradesh, due the erratic supply of oxygen; no relief even after dying as relatives of the dead patients have to wait hours, first for the ambulances or at the unending queue before the crematoriums with the ominous pyres burning day and night; people watching helplessly their inability to save their near and dear ones either in hospitals or in home isolation as they have to struggle for the precious oxygen cylinder; and huge queues before the vaccination centres with the most vulnerable senior citizens thus exposed for hours as the shortage of the vaccine doses continues still.

 

For the 7^thconsecutive day today the daily new infections in India have been in excess of an incredible (as compared to the first pandemic peak of around 97000 last year) mark of 3 Lakh, that is 3,00,000, and the daily deaths crossing the 2000 mark and even the 3000 mark in the last 24 hours. Such daily figures of new infections and fatalities are never witnessed before in any country of the world. Two days back the daily new cases crossed 3.5 Lakh and the next day a sense of a false relief was created with the new cases coming down to around 3.23 Lakh, because it has again risen to 3, 60,960 in the last 24 hours and the devastating figure of fatalities at 3293, with total COVID-19 deaths also crossing the 2-Lakh mark. The total number of active cases is approaching the never-before 3 million mark, and total pandemic infections closing on the 18 million mark, with the last few millions added in just days.

 

Whatever ‘light’ we seemed to see in our last post turned out to be a mirage, because all shortages of vaccines, oxygen, hospital beds, medicines, burial or cremation spots continue unabated. Despite the decision to cover all above the age of 18 for vaccination from the 1^st of May 2021, the shortage of the doses is yet to be resolved, with the seemingly crucial decision to decentralize the buying/distribution of vaccination turning out to be discriminatory. Within days of the decision the two vaccine manufacturers of India, the Serum Institute of India (SII) and Bharat Biotech, announced the prices: the SII fixing Rs.400/- per dose for state governments and Rs. 600/- per dose for private hospitals while Bharat Biotech fixing a quite a high price of Rs. 1200/- per dose for the states and private hospitals. The feature of the discrimination is that both the firms are going to continue selling the vaccines @150 INR to the Government of India, the biggest bulk purchaser, and that the vaccines are going to be free at all government hospitals across India.

 

While the vaccine manufacturers have no other option but to increase the prices to make the production economically viable, the Indian states, with their limited resources, have been singled out for discrimination; and most of the states have already been forced to declare free vaccines due to the politics of vaccination started by none other than the national ruling party. The Government of India has been boasting of ‘one nation, one identity’, but it has failed miserably to ensure ‘one nation, one vaccination’ ideally based on a uniform buying price and then the provision of free vaccine doses for everyone everywhere across the country. It is feared by many economists/experts that such a differential discriminatory pricing policy would lead to lopsided distribution and even black marketing.

 

Further, although the supply of oxygen can done only by the central government there has been politics of allegations and charges between it and the state governments, as patients continue to struggle, gasp and die from the continuing shortage of oxygen. The bone of contention is apparently clear: while the medial liquid oxygen or oxygen 02 is never in shortage in terms of overall production across the country, the problem is of transporting it to the desired destinations through the extremely limited tankers and cylinders which are mostly at the disposal of the respective state governments.

 

There has been no admission of the naked shortcomings or apology for the unfortunate deaths from the central government whose supreme leader continues to speak his mind to the nation every month, but never wanting to know the minds of his citizens or deciding to admit the hardship and deaths caused to his subjects due to the scarcity. Some state governments also cannot escape the blame of indulging in mindless politics. For example, the Chief Minister of the worst-hit Delhi region by oxygen shortage seems to have only allegations to make rather than doing something concrete, and besides, he has been doing the unpardonable act of appearing in advertising spots across the news channels and spending tons of money at that. The Delhi High Court had to come in the act by severely criticizing both the central and the state governments.

 

And yes, polling yet to conclude in West Bengal with the last phase taking place tomorrow, the 29^th May. With just two phases and around two days left for rallies the Election Commission of India (ECI) finally had done the ‘too little too late’ act, banning political rallies, but still allowing public meetings of up to 500 attendees, it is not being clear under which COVID protocol. This too, had come after scathing attack on the ECI by the Kolkata and then the Madras High courts respectively.

 

Experts are hoping for a peak in mid-May for the second COVID-19 wave in India; however, at what more costs we are even scared to guess, if it comes at all. This huge man-made human tragedy (warnings available early as January 2021 regarding new mutants from UK, Brazil and South Africa that in the meantime having had the Indian forms of the devastating 'double mutant' or even 'triple mutant' were totally ignored) has, obviously, put the health infrastructure under the severest of pressures that led to avoidable loss of precious lives. Accidental hospital fires and other accidents arising out of the chaos add to the absolute disaster. But our ‘leaders’ would not still budge from politicking, and would rush to take credit whenever the second wave comes under control and the peak reached. We have to ask the question: are we Indians the citizens of a democracy or are just the expendables, considering the hopeless numbers of us thronging the miserable country? A question our imperious rulers would never bother about; the onus is on us only to pray and stay safe. 

The IPL-2021 Charge Amid The Second COVID-19 Surge!

It is always debatable to have a major cricket tournament in the midst of an unprecedented surge of the pandemic, even though it is to be played behind closed doors, the new normal cricket variety, and with the imposition of a strict bio-secure bubble. As it has been seen so far several cricketers and support staff have contracted the COVID-19 virus, and since the tournament is being held across six venues—Chennai, Mumbai, Delhi, Ahmedabad, Bangalore and Kolkata—it would entail constant air travel and change of hotels for the eight participating teams. Further, the venues are the capitals of the worst affected states, except perhaps for Kolkata in West Bengal where the rising trend of new cases has not yet caught up with the others. It is to be noted that the IPL-2020 had to be taken out of India to the UAE due to strict lockdowns across the nation, and this means that within six months another IPL is being held, now in India where the second surge has reached unprecedented levels, but of course, complete lockdowns are not the desired goal thus far and travel restrictions are not imposed strictly.

 

However, the importance of the biggest professional T20 tournament of the world, Indian Premiere League, can only be compared to the inevitability of the elections in the country—one injects the much-needed business into the economy and the other new governments—both being considered desperate, particularly under the present circumstances. The assembly elections in five states should have ideally ended on 6^th April 2021, but for West Bengal where desperate reasons needed desperately-long phases of polling that will continue till 29^thof April. Further, the world of cricket in entirety, not just the organizers BCCI, has set their eyes on this competition which would be the last major rehearsal for the upcoming ICC World Cup T20 in October-November in India this year. Almost all of the participating nations have sent in their top players for that precious practice. It is also for this reason only that the BCCI could not afford to postpone the tournament, even by a few months.

 

The eight franchisees—Chennai Super Kings (CSK), Mumbai Indians (MI), Royal Challengers Bangalore (RCB), Kolkata Knight Riders (KKR), Delhi Capitals (DC), Sunrisers Hyderabad (SRH), Rajasthan Royals (RR) and Punjab Kings (PK, changed from the earlier Kings XI Punjab). As we mentioned earlier, the matches will be played across six venues with no ‘home team’ tag assigned to any of the teams. The first match of the 14^th version of the IPL is set to kick off tonight, the 9^th of April 2021, at 7.30 pm in Chennai between defending champions and Rohit Sharma-led MI and India-captain Virat Kohli-led RCB, whereas the second match will take place in Mumbai tomorrow, the 10^th of April 2021, between MS Dhoni-led CSK and DC, led by Rishabh Pant in the absence of Shreyas Iyer due to injury, at the same time. On two-match days the first match will start at 3.30 pm, and all the matches are to be played from 9^thApril to 30^th May. The pre-2020 title sponsor, Vivo, has been brought back too.

 

On the COVID-19 second wave surge, the national daily cases reached 1, 31,968, the highest so far, with a worrying fatality figure of 780 in the last twenty-four hours; out of those cases the worst-affected state Maharashtra accounted for 56286 new daily cases and 376 daily deaths. The following are the others in terms of severity; Chhattisgarh, Uttar Pradesh, Karnataka, Delhi, Kerala, Madhya Pradesh, Tamil Nadu, Gujarat, Rajasthan, Punjab, Haryana and West Bengal. This crisis is not at all helped by the currently raging vaccine-shortage controversy: the shortage staring at several states including the crisis-ridden Maharashtra where, as per news reports, around 50 vaccination centres in Mumbai stopped giving jabs from today; and the Government of India has been on a constant denial of any shortage, emphasizing rather on reducing wastage of the vaccines, and Prime Minister Narendra Modi even talked of a vaccination festival during 11^th –14^th April 2021.

 

Well, politics and cricket go hand in hand in defining India, and irrespective of the intensity with which we hope for at least a politics-free COVID-19 fight the play (of politics) never left us alone, even during the pandemic as we have seen since May 2020. Now, politics is not going to ebb till the 2^ndof May when results of the assembly elections would be announced while the other play (cricket) would continue unabated till May 30 2021. However, in favour of the latter one can say that the worried public, who are basically blamed for their COVID inappropriate behaviour as being the main cause of the surge, will have at least time-pass avenues every evening thanks to the IPL charge.

India Beat England In A Decider Thriller: Win ICC Cricket World Cup Super League Series!

 

Sam Curran

Of course, history does repeat itself from time to time; but the history of successfully chasing 337 runs in a one-day international (ODI) match does not repeat itself too often.  Thanks to some incredible display of power batting by Jonny Bairstow and Ben Stokes England chased 337 and defeated India by 6 wickets the other day in the second ODI of the ICC World Cup Super League series thus levelling the 3-match series. Although India posted a target, a little less than the other day, of 329 today England nearly repeated history again with bowling allrounder Sam Curran (95 not out) taking over charge. It rankled in the minds of Indian fans that the famed batting strength of the hosts wasted 8 balls of the Indian innings as there were no batsmen left, and that they could have set a target well over 350 runs. In the bargain were treated to a real nail-biter of a match that India, studded with dropped catches and misfields, finally managed to win by 7 runs thus winning the Series 2-1 and lifting the Paytm Trophy. Not to speak of the fact that Kohli lost the toss yet again, for the sixth time in a row.

 

Indian batting faltered after a solid foundation was laid by the openers Rohit Sharma and Shikhar Dhawan between whom 103 runs were scored only in the 15^thover. England, persisting with the two spinners, suddenly unleashed them on the Indians and it was not exactly clear whether they got some lethal turn on this batting heaven or the Indians showed lack of application. Adil Rashid tore through the gate bowling Rohit (37) and then having a well-set Dhawan (67) in matter of two overs; joining him Moeen Ali tore through the gate this time of Virat Kohli (7) clean bowling him; and perhaps inspired by the duo Liam Livingstone was brought in by the stand-in English captain Jos Buttler and KL Rahul (7) was caught off Livingstone, suddenly India sliding to 157/4 in the 25^thover with the hope of crossing the 300 mark resting solely on Rishabh Pant and Hardik Pandya.

 

Pant again thrilled cricket lovers by a superlative innings of 78 runs in 62 balls with 5 fours and 4 sixes, and Pandya (66 runs in 44 balls, 5 fours and 4 sixes) carried on after Pant departed with cameos from Krunal Pandya (25) and Shardul Thakur (30). It is thanks to the balanced Team India that a total of 329 runs could still be reached which was no mean target for any opposition under any circumstances.

 

England managed to keep up the momentum not allowing the asking rate to climb alright, but the fall of wickets at regular intervals diminished their hopes phase by phase. With the fall of Buttler at the team score of 95/4 the match came back overwhelmingly in India’s favour, and the joy of Kohli and team was to be seen when the DRS proved Buttler out LBW. But Sam Curran had other ideas. First, he built a 57-run partnership with Rashid, then 60-run partnership with Mark Wood and fought till the last over when the last man Topley was only there to give him company. Curran stopped taking singles keeping himself on the firing line, looking for fours and sixes, and he nearly pulled it off. Hardik dropped him early on and was later dropped by Natarajan. England, although vanquished, must be given due credit for their all-out efforts to bowl India out and their magnificent fielding all around the park that saved at least 20 runs, and of course, the late match-defining charge led by Curran.

 

The Indian pacers bowled with determination, particularly Bhuvneshwar Kumar who clean-bowled Jason Roy in the very first over after being hit fiercely and then Bairstow, and Shardul Thakur who took the crucial wickets of Malan, Buttler and Livingstone. However, 18 runs given away by Thakur in his last over at a crucial juncture of the match and dropping a crucial catch in the dying moments of the match did not do him much good. Natarajan, replacing spinner Yadav, captured the prize wicket of Stokes after the latter was dropped by Hardik off the bowling of Kumar, and bowled the last over of the match keeping his nerve, particularly after dropping Curran moments back, and England could not get the 14 runs required for a match and a series win. Most deservingly Sam Curran was adjudged man-of-the-match. Jonny Bairstow was given the man-of-the-series award, again a most deserving candidate.  

       

In this England Tour of India, the hosts have beaten the visitors in all three formats: winning the Test Series 3-1 thus qualifying for the World Test Championship Final; winning the T20I Series 3-2 and the ODI Series 2-1. For the next two months IPL-2021 is going to capture the imagination of the Indian cricket fans and revelers.