SATURDAY, APRIL 20, 2024
Home isolation in separate rooms
One of the advisories dished out by the authorities is that persons who are home quarantined need to be in a separate room with attached bathroom. And that the things they use should also be exclusive and washed separately. Knowing the housing situations in India, do they know how many people in India have a luxury of owning a house? How many rooms the house would have? How many people reside in a house? Whether the rooms have bathrooms with 24X7 running water? There are so many such vexing issues but the authorities with blinkers on their eyes and sitting in ivory towers give such ‘well-intentioned advice’ to the common persons. Such people who live in houses that have several rooms that are palatial and provided free by the government or in Lutyens bungalows are poking fun at the expense of the people. Instead of walking with their noses in the air and a snobbish attitude, they need to be aware of the ground realities and not come out with weird and non-implementable advices with a smug face.
Sridhar D’Iyer,
Caranzalem
Complacency fuelled COVID disaster
The country's health care system and hospitals are on the verge of collapse and crematoriums are overloaded with corpses. The country got through the first wave of the coronavirus relatively unscathed, but the second one has been a catastrophe mainly due to the inconceivable mistakes of the government.
Gory scenes were witnessed in a parking lot in Delhi, where dozens of shrouded corpses lay in rest in the open while workers pile wood into pyres.
A second wave of the coronavirus is ravaging the country harsher and deadlier than what much of the world has seen since the pandemic began. Helpless families are rushing from hospital to hospital in search of beds for loved ones.
With over 350,000 cases recorded every day and death stalking every corner, patients and families are racing against time pleading for oxygen and medication outside overcrowded hospitals and often they end up mourning. A mixture of hubris, recklessness and incompetence has driven the country into disaster and we are witnessing a crime against humanity.
As recently as January, Prime Minister Narendra Modi had boasted that India had the pandemic under control and his political party celebrated him as a visionary who had defeated COVID-19.
Quick on the heels to buttress that argument at the beginning of March, the health minister saw the end game approaching when he announced that the overall situation was under control and barely a month later, PM Modi dropped a bombshell stating that the coronavirus has now swept over the country like a "toofan”, a perfect storm. Instead of moving to contain the catastrophe when the country still could have done so, the politicians did everything they could to fuel it.
All the while, Modi frequently used his slogan of economic "atmanirbhar,” or self-reliance, the message being that India is strong and doesn’t need outside help. Ironically when things went out of control the whole world stepped in on humanitarian grounds to provide all out medical help to stop the menace of the rampaging virus.
Yet the media and Modi buffs are still ranting praises of his achievements when the whole word has put him under notice for his jingoistic propaganda. People relied more on social media and foreign TV channels for unbiased news.
Everette Assis Telles,
Margao
Insensitive govt
“I am ready to sleep on the floor or any corner of the hospital but please admit me and give me the treatment. I cannot bear the pain”. These are the most pathetic words expressed by one patient in the District Hospital as indicated in your daily on May 1.
What a misery of life this Corona virus has made of human life but worst than that is the rude and rough handling of the whole situation by the so-called people friendly government of Sawant for whom we cannot accept a choice of the people.
The positions of the Ministers are become like a joke because knowing that they are unfit to handle their jobs still they are appointed. There is nothing professionalism in them especially to handle the current crisis. And on top of it, as it is given in the same issue of Herald thru your editorial, the Tourism Minister was found dancing a? one party while people are crying on the other side.
‘Vah re vah’, Tourism Minister Saib! Emperor Nero was found singing and fiddling with his musical instrument when Rome was burning. Your example is more or less is the same.
A.Veronica Fernandes, Candolim
Being humane towards cops
A video which has gone viral on the social media shows a couple from UP abusing a cop on duty with filthy words just because the policeman had stopped their car and asked the couple to wear the mask. The cops are only doing their duty however many-a-times they are at the receiving end of irritated citizens. It must be said that during the pandemic and the lockdown, cops are the unsung heroes.
These frontline workers have to do multiple tasks besides investigating crimes, chasing robbers, maintaining law and order, regulating the flow of traffic. These tasks during the pandemic include penalizing those who do not wear the mask or move about in groups. During the lockdown the cops have to do the added duty of seeing that people remain indoors. They have to be on their feet throughout the night as they keep a check on those moving about in the night. This is no mean task.
We as citizens can make the life of the men-in-uniform that much easier by sticking to all the pandemic and lockdown related protocols. Unlike in some of the states in the country, policemen in Goa get a lot of respect from the citizens. No one dares to question the cops on duty. Those who challenge the police in Goa could be the tourists who visit the state. We need to be more humane towards the law-keepers because of whom there is discipline in the society.
Adelmo Fernandes,
Vasco
Encountering digitisation
Reference Plastino D’Costa's article Goa digital Options (Herald, 29 April), I endorse what he has elucidated. As a senior citizen it is difficult enought to comply digitally and online with poor infrastructure and unreliability having to risk hacking, remember passwords, type in OTPs etc without being harassed and confusion being unecessarily created!
Just when I have typed in an OTP, there is a problem with the server. Now the bank goes off line and I wonder if amount is credited to the party. The constant BSNL posts as mentioned, when there are standing instructions with the bank has confused me and the bank which was sending me reminders to have enough balance. This was not happening with my electricity bill! When the bank tried to correct this the bill was paid twice! When the electricity and BSNL bills can easily be paid via the banks, why cannot the water bill? The site www.goaonline.gov.in mentioned on the bill, is not accepted by any recognized servers for payment as faulty and unsafe! Have informed the customer service cell and they are looking into it. To quote Plastino "No point talking big about online digital services if government keeps adding layer after layer to its processes".
John Eric Gomes,
Porvorim
