Statement on India's Covid-19 Crisis by HfHR's India-Based Members

We are members of Hindus for Human Rights based in various Indian states and cities. Each of us is fighting our own battles with CoVID, and we are equally devastated to witness the sufferings of those less privileged than ourselves. We came together to write this joint testimony.

The second wave of CoVID has enveloped all of us in deep grief and rendered us with a feeling of helplessness. During the first wave, many of us were involved in on-ground relief work and supporting migrants through various interventions. But the situation now is different. We have family members and friends all across India who have at least one member affected, seriously ill or dead. With higher infection and death rates, the second wave is raging, affecting youth and old alike.

Amidst this ongoing catastrophe, the Indian government had the novel idea of exporting 6.6 crore doses of Made-in-India vaccines to other countries to boost its global image. They ended up ruining it anyhow when articles in the international media such as TIME and The Guardian came out in a blunt critique of the Modi regime. Only 2% of the Indian population is vaccinated, and there has been a vaccine scarcity all along; 18-45-year-olds (all of us are within this age group) haven’t even received an opportunity to get vaccinated. 

The social media narratives of distressed patients and their relatives running from pillar to post to find hospital beds, oxygen cylinders, plasma donors and medicines have been unbearable to watch. We believe all this was entirely avoidable; or at least, the intensity could have been reduced multifold. So we ask, why didn’t the government do anything? Why was it busy in hate-mongering of Muslims, relaxing guidelines for Hindu festivals/gatherings and election rallies, and curbing social media dissent on factual blunders of government in dealing with CoVID?

But, government failure has put the parallel machinery of civil society organisations and individuals at the forefront. In addition to existing civil society organizations, many volunteer groups have sprung up, which have been coordinating the delivery of essential medicines, providing data pools of plasma donors, oxygen cylinders, hospitals, etc. There is rising solidarity among citizens regarding their elected representatives, who chose to ignore them in their most difficult times. They are speaking up without fear for themselves and their fellow citizens. 

It is in this collective strength and forbearance that we see hope. 

It is this hope that we want to proliferate for India and the world.

asato mā sadgamaya,

tamaso mā jyotirgamaya,

mṛtyormā'mṛtaṃ gamaya.

From falsehood lead me to truth,

From darkness lead me to light,

From death lead me to immortality.