Musings During the Pandemic
By Leena Pujari, Thane, India
Where do I begin, and how do I narrate? My mind wanders around so often that it becomes a trifle difficult to collect my thoughts. I live in a gated community in a Mumbai suburb, and since the lockdown I have seen and heard conflicting narratives, some deeply disturbing and some so soothing and uplifting that I know not what to make of this. Yes, we do live in unprecedented times, but does that justify an increasing onslaught on civil liberties? Increasing surveillance and policing not just by the state, but by communities and housing societies in the name of fighting COVID 19, raises important concerns about hard won freedoms and liberties that are just being whittled away at the drop of a hat. Increasing power that extra constitutional bodies abrogate to themselves during a pandemic is deeply worrying.
To have someone keep a watch over my movements is distinctly uncomfortable for me, and that is precisely what is happening where I live. The extent of infantilization is laughable. So I had someone tell me that I need not go out to pay my house help's salary, because apparently that was a non essential activity (not listed in the government's list of essential activities permitted during lockdown–but shouldn’t paying people be essential?), and so I needn't venture out (as though I had no sense of responsibility to the precautions to be observed in public space).
As I sift and sort through different stories and posts on social media of how people are coping with the spectre of loneliness and isolation during the lockdown, I am struck by the contradictions that are too stark to escape notice. Even as people go hungry, jobless, and homeless, and struggle to maintain a semblance of normalcy in their disrupted lives, social media is abuzz with pictures and posts of delicacies, beautiful homes, and pearls of wisdom on how to remain productive during the lockdown. I often wonder what being 'productive', 'engaged', and 'meaningful' means to a person whose life has taken a one eighty degree turn and who finds themselves without a job or a roof over their head. In fact, to be able to reflect, write a story and revisit cherished memories is also a matter of privilege. I am one of those privileged few.
I have my family around me. My daughter, who has been away from home for long, is now with us. For my mother, who often complains about being alone (we travel long distances to work), this is a time of great joy to have her children around her all the time. My sister, who moved to a different city for work, away from her son and husband, and is now on paid leave for her son's exams, is relieved that her leave got extended following the lockdown. This means snatching some extra moments with her family.
Even as I sometimes sink into depths of despair wondering how things could go so horribly wrong, small acts of kindness lift my spirits and give me hope. It is heartwarming to see how the civil society actors and ordinary citizens have responded to people in distress in these times of grave crisis, providing not just food and the much needed succor, but also starting initiatives to ease the burden of residents–and especially the old and ailing–within their neighborhoods.