Journalist Barkha Dutt's deeply analytical book 'To Hell and Back' tells us why so many Indians died, when they could have been saved. Here are some things she reminds us of.
It’s increasingly difficult to find a clear, logical justification for policies, which at this point are defensive and rooted in fear. The govt must improve its quarantine system.
Researchers from California, Pennsylvania and Chicago universities surveyed households in Rajasthan, UP, Bihar, Jharkhand, MP, and Maharashtra to also find a drastic fall in monthly income.
More than 15 million Indians lost their jobs in May during 2nd wave. The daily average wage for about 230 million dropped below Rs 375. All of this is leading to an increase in hunger.
Krea University researchers surveyed 2,083 non-agricultural enterprises in Bihar, Chhattisgarh, Madhya Pradesh, and Odisha to examine the impact of Covid-19 on women-led MSMEs.
According to Delhi Police, 62% of all cyber complaints were related to financial fraud, 24% involved social media while the rest were cases of extortion, hate speech and others.
Government tells Parliament toll collections touched Rs 70,278 crore in 2025-26, Rajasthan has highest number of toll plazas, while expenditure on operating plazas is not maintained centrally.
Our education system is a destroyer of all talent by enforcing learning by rote, pushing students to coaching classes to ‘crack’ competitive exams. And then, papers leak.
Essentially, Modi followed a common sense approach. Given that we have huge area and population along with limited testing and supporting care infrastructure, he decided initially on a complete lock down. This was expected to control the spread of infection, which the data now shows it indeed has. But to remove lock down and be ready to take on new infection cases, he need more time to organize testing and care infrastructure for infected persons in time to come. Hence, he has extended the lock down till 3rd May with limited exceptions. As the virus is not going away anytime soon, we will have more and more cases coming up in due course but we are now ready with required testing kits, ventilators, PPEs, ICU beds etc. We have managed to do a quite a bit of innovation and Make in India for cheap ventilators, testing kits, PPEs etc. So as we go ahead, we will have corona among us but we are ready to fight with testing and quarantine, hospitalization etc along with younger population developing immunity in due course. We will have to wear masks, hand gloves etc, maintain social distancing and protect elderly and those with co-morbidity like diabetics, heart conditions, pneumonia etc. Fortunately, this corona is not very deadly and finally very few require ICU with ventilation support.
Not sure what model is this but perhaps there is no other go till vaccine is ready or some medicines are found.
Essentially, Modi followed a common sense approach. Given that we have huge area and population along with limited testing and supporting care infrastructure, he decided initially on a complete lock down. This was expected to control the spread of infection, which the data now shows it indeed has. But to remove lock down and be ready to take on new infection cases, he need more time to organize testing and care infrastructure for infected persons in time to come. Hence, he has extended the lock down till 3rd May with limited exceptions. As the virus is not going away anytime soon, we will have more and more cases coming up in due course but we are now ready with required testing kits, ventilators, PPEs, ICU beds etc. We have managed to do a quite a bit of innovation and Make in India for cheap ventilators, testing kits, PPEs etc. So as we go ahead, we will have corona among us but we are ready to fight with testing and quarantine, hospitalization etc along with younger population developing immunity in due course. We will have to wear masks, hand gloves etc, maintain social distancing and protect elderly and those with co-morbidity like diabetics, heart conditions, pneumonia etc. Fortunately, this corona is not very deadly and finally very few require ICU with ventilation support.
Not sure what model is this but perhaps there is no other go till vaccine is ready or some medicines are found.