The Covid-19 pandemic has brought extreme suffering and hardship to people all over the world. Even though some form of lockdowns are inevitable to control the spread of disease, to mitigate their economic impact they need to be complemented with generous expansion of social welfare schemes. Unfortunately, Indian government’s response has been most stringent in terms of lockdown, but very stingy when it comes to social welfare. This has led to the poor bearing disproportionate burden of this pandemic.

RoadScholarz have been keeping track of hardship and deaths caused by mismanagement of the lockdown to highlight these issues. We have also been advocating for universal PDS to ensure food security for all Indians during this crises.

Lockdown Deaths

RoadScholarz Kanika and Aman in collaboration with Thejesh GN from Datameet have been tracking deaths caused due to mismanagement and poor planning of the lockdown. As on 5-May 2020, the database contains information of 338 such deaths. These include varied underlying causes such as starvation, financial distress, exhaustion while walking home or in queues etc. Since this data is based on media reports, and given the under-reporting in Indian media of such issues, this should be regarded as just the tip of the iceberg of the great humanitarian crises created by this lockdown.

The database can be accessed here. Media coverage based on this data can be found here, here and here.

Overflowing Granaries and Empty Stomachs

India currently (March-2020) has 77 million tonnes of food grains in stock with FCI (Food Corporation of India), which is likely to rise even further after rabi procurement. These are more three times the buffer stock norms and sufficient to universalize PDS (Public Distribution System).

Many state governments can’t afford to procure these at normal prices from the Central Government. We have been advocating for the Central Government to release these food-stocks to states for free (or at nominal price).  Statewise undercoverage figures are available Undercoverage in the PDS NFSA.