Covid-19 big picture

Business Standard     16th May 2020     Save    

Context: A bird eye view to the problems and action taken due to COVID provides a stark picture of the future.

Impact of COVID: Now and in future

  • Loss of life
        • Doubling rate not slow enough: It might place India among the top four Covid-hit countries, behind the US, Russia and Brazil.
  • Economic loss:
      • Stock market continue to react to short term news
      • Decline in economic growth.

Critique of Government steps 

    • Govt. has cleverly designed the package to minimize the actual outlay, little has been done to improve state govts. spending ability. Limit of government capacity is visible.
    • Poor relief to the migrants: absence of work in rural areas due to collapse of government make-work (MGNREGA) programme. Prospects of poverty rise are increasing.
    • Scrapping of labour laws by state governments and apathetic treatment by employers have added to the miseries of migrant worker class.  

Conclusion: The answer to problematic law is not lawlessness. Besides, arbitrary laws repel sought- after investors as it creates more confusion. It should be responsibility of all to create a sense of shared fortune or mutual belonging.