A prime minister turns his back on India

Indian Christian priests and others throw flower petals on the grave of Father Rolfie D'Souza's who died of COVID-19 after his burial at a cemetery in Prayagraj, India, Saturday, May 15, 2021. (AP Photo/Rajesh Kumar Singh)

Connections aren’t easy to draw between dark chocolate and cow urine. But both are recommended as Covid-19 cures by top leaders of India’s ruling party as the country flails amidst a catastrophic second wave. Officially, India has recorded over 28 million infections and 329,100 deaths as of June 2. But reporters tracking hospitals and crematoriums across the country have shown the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) government to be suppressing the actual extent of the toll, which is estimated to be at least five times higher. As the virus moves deeper into villages, the daily news dispatches show rows of dead bodies on riverbanks or floating underwater because the victims’ families are too poor to afford the rising costs of funeral rituals. Some have pointed out to BJP’s health minister that if they can’t buy funeral wood at its going rates, they are unlikely to stock up on such luxuries as “dark chocolate with 70 percent cocoa.”

Those opposing the dubious health benefits of cow urine haven’t gotten away with it, however. Cows are holy animals for a section of Hindus and a political mascot for the Hindu-nationalist BJP. On May 13th, an activist in the north-eastern state of Manipur posted an update on Facebook mourning the death of BJP’s leader from Covid-19 and stressing that the disease is cured not by cow urine but “science and common sense.” He was arrested afterward under India’s stringent National Security Act. Four days later, an influential BJP politician exhorted party workers in the central Indian city of Bhopal, her mask defiantly pulled down, to drink cow urine as a “proven protection” against Covid-19.

The leader who refuses to speak up on India’s Covid-19 disaster is prime minister Narendra Modi himself. In mid-April, India became the world’s worst-hit nation from the pandemic. According to the Indian Council of Medical Research, one in five Indians between 18 and 44 have been exposed to the virus. For two months now, social media forums have been flooded with urgent calls for help to secure hospital beds, oxygen cylinders and critical medicines as these resources become scarcer. Experts attribute a number of India’s Covid-19 deaths not to the virus alone but to the government’s indifference. For a prime minister that loves to make speeches, Mr. Modi avoids Covid-19 as a topic as much as he can. In the past two months, he has addressed election rallies, inaugurated government schemes, and participated in virtual book launches. But although he has dramatically shed a few tears, he hasn’t held a single press conference or invited questions from the public on their number one concern right now.

In an open letter to the Indian press, a group of psychiatrists, several of whom work for national centers, told journalists to refrain from “panic-inducing coverage” of Covid-19. Defending itself against charges of oxygen deprivation, the central government’s lawyer told the administrators of India’s capital not to act like “cry babi[es].” Twenty-five Covid-19 patients died in a Delhi hospital because of oxygen shortages in the preceding week.

On the rare occasions when Mr. Modi has mentioned Covid-19 in his monologues, he has either confused or alienated his listeners. On May 14, while addressing rural farmers as part of launching a state scheme, he advised them to get vaccinated in large numbers—but India is facing a vaccine shortage so dire that some of the centers in its biggest cities have shuttered. On May 20, Delhi’s government announced it was going to close half of the vaccination centers because it had only a day’s supply left.

In a May 11 tweet, Mr. Modi told Indians to keep calm and practice yoga and meditation. This advice was met with outrage. “Sir, should we poor fight death or do yoga? [If] We start doing yoga, who is going to wait outside the hospital and tend to our parents and siblings?” one of his followers tweeted back, attaching the image of a patient gasping for breath. Faced with a barrage of complaints from the family and friends of critical patients, the chief minister of BJP’s provincial government in Uttar Pradesh threatened to press terrorism charges against those who dared to “increase fear amongst the public.”

The prime minister and his party would rather have Indians “celebrating the power of positivity.” The government’s wide-ranging “positivity campaign” includes instructions to senior officials to promote its “positive work” and a series of lectures from spiritual leaders organized by an affiliate organization to “counter the atmosphere of negativity.” Ahead of his monthly radio address in April, as India crossed 25 million infections, Mr. Modi asked Indians to share “inspiring stories” that he could recount in the next edition of his monthly radio address. Several people wrote back to him saying that the only “positivity” they could access was in the Covid-19 test reports piling up around them.

For the first time in Mr. Modi’s seven-year tenure, he has failed to distract Indians from his government’s debacles by asking them to rise above their selfish interests and focus on the nation’s future glory. In the past, he successfully shifted the public mood by sharing photographs of him feeding peacocks on his Delhi lawns or meditating in Himalayan caves. He could ask his adoring followers to blame a “foreign hand” for India’s troubles or to try countering poverty with inner peace, and they obeyed. His government could put out false statements and make its own version of the truth go viral on WhatsApp  .

But Covid-19 changed that. The harshest criticisms of the government’s handling of the pandemic are coming from its staunchest supporters. Their fight with him is personal. Tagging him on social media networks, they are questioning his decision to prioritize winning elections over saving lives. In cities and villages across BJP-ruled regions, his once diehard followers are comparing the enormous toll from Covid-19 in their own communities against the official statistics posted on government websites. They are angry with them for enabling the worst tragedy in their lives and for ignoring their urgent calls for help. Two recent surveys show sharp dips in Modi’s approval ratings, his popularity going.

On May 21, as the second wave began to slow down, Modi surfaced to mourn the dead. “This virus has snatched many of our loved ones from us. I pay my humble tribute to them and I express my condolences to the families who lost people," he said in a video speech — his voice choking, eyes moist, lower lip quivering, and beard reaching for the floor. For large numbers of Indians, the solace is too little, too late. Exactly a month before Modi’s address, a BJP supporter named Rahul Rai lost his father to Covid-19. He was hospitalized in Varanasi, the prime minister’s electoral constituency, for 20 days before drawing his last breath. “At the first hospital, the oxygen ran out. By the time we found a bed in another hospital, one that had oxygen, it was too late. Oxygen delay is why he died,” Rai said on the phone from Varanasi. “While my father and mother were struggling against Covid-19, I posted several tweets to the prime minister and the others in charge, seeking help to arrange for oxygen, hospital bed, remdesivir, but no one responded. When I reached the crematorium, there were 108 bodies lined up for the pyre. It was so crowded there wasn’t a spot where you could stand,” he said. He feels betrayed. “I voted for the BJP. I was a huge Modi supporter. I used to pick up a fight with anyone who dared to speak against him. If they couldn’t help people like us, they could have at least stood by us. This tragedy breaks you.”