COVID and States

Odisha, in spite of a poor public health system, did well in managing the pandemic in the initial month. This is on account of three reasons. It drew from its now globally recognised swift disaster preparedness and management aimed at zero casualty. It adopted a proactive, as against reactive, course, which in itself is a difficult proposition in such an uncertain and dynamic scenario. It took lessons from success stories and challenges based on happenings elsewhere.

India experienced a mass exodus of informal sector workers who were heading out of cities, bound homewards. Given the paucity of transport infrastructure, this is translating into one of the greatest mass tragedies of post-independence India. This has been rationalised as a combination of people moving out because of a lockdown-induced loss of earnings and irrational fears stoked by the pandemonium. This exodus is, in fact, a perfectly rational response to the rapid spread of the virus in informal housing localities. Three different policies are outlined whose combination could have, and can still, reduce, if not entirely stop, the exodus.

Among the states, Bihar faces the greatest challenge, particularly in terms of the reverse migration occurring from the lockdown following the COVID-19 pandemic. Considering the poor state of its health services infrastructure, the state government should have taken urgent and appropriate measures to screen, test and quarantine the returning migrant workers. This article takes a look at the trajectory of the government’s response to the health crisis.

Aided by the Government of Kerala, the farmers in Kuttanad are continuing to show resistance through cooperation and resilience.

One of the many effects of COVID-19 pandemic disaster is also visible on legislative, executive and financial federalism in India. The constitutional mandate for functioning of centre on behalf of states has been missed and recourse to disaster has been taken to undertake unified but unconsented measures.