THURSDAY, APRIL 25, 2024
Sujay Gupta
If this was some perverse joke, it would be time to say, well done guys, you are now orange. The gut-wrenching truth is that people in the government are still not raising nor seeing the red flags, as we move precariously in allowing a situation under control to slip away but just being simply loose with our checks and balances
When the Chief Minister dismisses the fact that 8 positive cases were detected in two days by saying these are ‘imported’, it induces a sick stomach churn. What does this even mean? If “imported’ is the chosen one let’s play with that word if that’s the language that is understood. Who allowed the “imports” to happen? The government did. Who allowed the imports to be allowed into Goa without foolproof checks? No marks for guessing. Who let them in and allowed at least one person we know to escape from the border police, go to Vasco, not follow quarantine there and then go-to his residential society in Ribandar and claim, he was going into quarantine, with his family whom he could have potentially infected and then move to another flat and a bungalow? And then an IAS officer says that the man is in “quarantine” in a bungalow and one can’t go after him. He may be clear of COVID but what if he was infected and infected those he met before he went into his chosen bungalow to lock himself in.
So let us not look at the movement of people as imports and exports because people are not goods. And goods do not spread the Coronavirus, people do and an “imported” COVID positive can infect a local Goan because there are many touch points between the time rapid testing is done to the final testing if rapid tests indicate that the person is COVID positive.
And then here is the hitherto inconceivable situation where people tested negative in quarantine in Mumbai are showing up in Goa and turning COVID positive.
The government is indeed caught in a cleft stick. Damned if you don’t allow Goa to open up to allow economic activities and damned if you do. But this comes with a rider. The government should hear this and hear this well. If you stick to economics being the core principle of decision making on whether to open up or not, then limit yourself to that. But if you allow emotions, limited public sentiment and pressure from MLAs to allow the mass return of Goans stranded abroad and in other parts of India, then the principal reason for allowing Goa to open up internally (with the exception of essential supplies from other states), i.e. economics gets violated.
While 8 cases, relatively speaking is a very tiny blip on the COVOD radar, this calculation is relative. It’s relative to what Goa had managed to become and after having turned safe, is sitting on a tinder box of exploding cases. This is not being alarmist, it is simply being realistic.
What is ironic is that each of the Chief Ministers' statements in the past 48 hours emanates from the manner in which his government has handled the sudden influx of people into Goa. He allowed trains carrying people from red zones to stop at Goa post-which he asks non-Goans not to come to Goa for a holiday.
When you allow trains to arrive in your state, you cannot filter Goans, non-Goans, or for that matter those who live in Goa and have homes and those who do not. It is too complex an exercise. There is a thin line between those coming on holidays and those coming to their second homes in Goa. Almost half of Delhi’s uber-rich have properties in Goa and can show a legit reason to come ”home”.
This was a disaster waiting to happen. In the garb, of being stranded, there are many who are slipping in to simply escape their red zone existence and move into a green zone. And this disaster has been compounded by the fact that many have slipped in, rather then move in with all checks and balances, and are completely out of the radar, not having been checked at their point of entry. These are people who are not in quarantine.
Thus, imagine a situation that for every 50 people who pass through checks and controls there are 5 who slip in unchecked.
Meanwhile, let’s take a moment to look at the non-‘imported’ cases, our own Goans returning. Among them are close to 7000 Goan seafarers returning home. With absolute respect to the sentiments of their friends and family, there could be an outside chance that 1 % of these returnees are COVID positive i.e. 70 cases.
The push to kick-start Goa was imperative. But what is happening now is beyond that. This is very little confidence that the system of checks and security at our borders is not allowing freeloaders on vegetable trucks or simply those taking jungle paths to cross the border.
Or for that matter letting people actually ride in. Stories like this are being heard. A young man from Hyderabad showed up at the cash counter of a bank in Margao and admitted to the cashier that he just rode from Hyderabad and was not stopped or checked anywhere, even at the border.He claimed that he would take the cash go home and quarantine himself. But what if he had infected people along the way from Hyderabad and in Goa?
Nothing is surprising anymore though. When a man who has arrived in Goa from Rajasthan on May 6 manages to have pass for this movement dated May 7 to May 9, after having escaped from the border check post on May 6, there is very little left to be said, except “Well done, congratulations, for turning Goa from green to orange”.
There is only one way ahead, tighten up or shut down totally. Restoring livelihoods cannot come with such a heavy price tag.
