People Like Us!!

The Harvard Business Review had an interesting case study / paper published about 20-odd years ago, known as "Parable of the Sadhu". To provide a precis version of it, the author is going up on a hike in the Himalayas when his group finds a sadhu in acute hypothermia. Without their intervention the Sadhu would be dead. If they intervened to ensure his safety, they would miss their once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to complete this hike. To cut a long story short, the group takes enough care of the sadhu to get him out of the hypothermia, but carried on on their journey. 

No one knows if the Sadhu survived or perished. 

Someone that I really respect (not many of them around), brought this parable to my attention and asked if in our rush to get back to normal, we are making face shields, masks, sanitizers whatever, similar to taking sadhu up to a point, but not making sure it is going to keep him alive.

I don't have an answer to this question as such. What I do know, is that it is very common to look at things in the short term, and only do what is necessary to solve this current problem and move on, instead of reflection on why this problem was created, and what we need to do to ensure it never happens again. Today it is COVID-19, tomorrow it could be something else, but the people who are impacted by it today, will be the ones who are impacted tomorrow as well. 

I would go so far as saying, that the amount of interest in COVID is primarily because it can happen to everyone - especially those who watch cable news and read newspapers at leisure. For years, we have known that our slums are unhygienic, and the urban poor really have to battle death at every corner of their daily routine, and we have not done anything about it. People like you and me, set up RO filters for our water, put up inverter backup for failing electricity, even take insurance for houses. We send our children to private school (and extra tuition on top of it!!). As far as possible, we would like to avoid any face with them. We even have separate utensils for them and some places do not even let them travel in the same elevators as us.. We live a life of privilege, even though we tell ourselves that we are "middle class". 

For someone living in the slums at Dharavi, COVID may not be any scarier than the cholera outbreaks or TB outbreak or coming under a train while doing your morning business. We are now trying to make sure that guy in Dharavi is safe, not because we care for him, rather that there is a chance that the illness might transmit to people like us. Once we come up with a way to make sure there's no way to get this from "them", past history suggests we won't even bother with what happens with the virus, let alone what happens to them, until the next COVID comes about 5-10 years from now. 

At no point, do I want to demean the risk of COVID-19. It is a dangerous illness that can be debilitating to anyone who contracts it. Just that some would have the ability to bounce back from it, but most who contract it might not even be counted in official statistics, and we would rather  lock them down some place where they are nowhere to be seen.  

Ask yourself this, if you were put in this situation, where you are invisible, not even a statistic, what would your reaction be? How long do you think your patience will last? Would you accept this or would you do something about it? 

If you did something about it, would you be anti-national? 

Will COVID-19 allow us to be completely honest about ourselves, or would we go back into our imaginary utopia once the hysteria subsides?

Saare reeti riwaaz hatakar

Dekho apne ghar ke andar

Shayad kahin kisi kone mein

Ghoom raha hai kaala bandar