The world is at war with an unseen virus, contemporaneously the world witnesses India battle forms of deadly colored virus!
A rare country where a mere assessment in the form of ‘higher secondary school examination’ supersedes survival of students; as our future generation remains most vulnerable, unprotected, and lethal to the colored virus.
Over the past two years, schools, universities, institutions, and offices both government and private globally adopted the virtual world and still continues to. India too embraced online education, as classrooms shifted to homes. Disparity remains apparent – urban homes had eyeful parents, snoozing students and rural homes had no internet facility, smartphones, or even electricity. This dramatic change caused a digital divide in the education system which remained and still remains a threat of the unseen virus. Its disastrous consequences is rather a nightmare and the sting will loom ad infinitum…thus it is fair to say that digital teaching is a death sentence to some…or most!
Teachers too struggled in the managerial revolution of this virtual world and some scorpion circulated disorder and ghastly disarray amongst students which lead to the flooding of sexual harassment reports on social media, bringing shame to awe-inspiring, compassionate, devoted, professional teachers who built bright future for multitudes including mine. The immediate arrest of a venomous teacher for sexually harassing students in Chennai, Tamil Nadu, India, and instantaneous intervention of the Tamil Nadu Government in creating a new Commission to exclusively monitor these forms of crimes and creating a helpline for such victims is most certainly plausible. There is a need for a ‘stringent paedo code.’
As higher secondary examinations are a breath away leaving millions of students most vulnerable as multitudes are victims of the colored virus either directly or indirectly, some suicidal and some even COVID-orphans. Online assessments are rather the most ‘responsible’ form of assessment considering the grave circumstances. Urban homes may have access to virtual assessments, but rural homes will be rather technically paralyzed and will suffer unjustly! When students are taught online, why can’t they be tested online…?
According to the World Health Organisation COVID-19 Guidelines, a room should not be populated with more than 2-4 people, but an examination hall will have 8-12 students at the very least which will be fatal.
Over-crowding in election campaigns, rituals, etc., leads to a deadly upshot, commutation to examination halls and crowding of students will cause grave consequences as COVID-19, Black Fungus, White Fungus, and Yellow Fungus and many more welcomes our future generation to the grave.
The Pillars of the Constitution are still living in the virtual world; compelling most vulnerable students to enter the factual and deadly world in this deadly epidemic era is genocide. Instead of eliminating anxiety, fear, and most importantly the risk coupled with immense mental pressure, the Government seems to ignite it. Health is wealth, children are our real wealth and there is a pressing need to uphold the Fundamental Right to the life of our future generation! Thus postponement may perhaps be the most ideal response.
Concomitantly, we witness a direct attack on the frontline warriors especially on our medical professionals in every sphere. At this juncture, all Leaders ought to protect them and all mankind ought to respect them, but what we witness is a classic example of a country attacking its own armed forces. Patients and attendees attacking and assaulting doctors, agitated due to lack of infrastructure, etc., are highly condemnable. Equipment and infrastructure are their weapons and it is the duty of the Statesmen to armor them! COVID-19 is a war and India cannot afford to lose any more of its warriors!
Personal Protective Equipment made out of garbage bags, interns, Resident Doctors remain unpaid or underpaid, public pelting stones on doctors and other medical professionals, landlords evicting doctors and medical personals, rejecting doctors in marriage proposals (a traditional culture in India), allocating COVID-19 duty to lactating mothers and other distressing scenarios are supreme disrespect to the COVID-19 martyrs and are heinous.
The bitter truth is there are no ‘Specialists’ anymore in the pandemic era! A dear friend of mine, an aspiring oncologist of the pandemic eon now has neither a vision nor a mission in the field of oncology due to her celestial dedication to COVID duties (she is compelled to). The laws that govern Junior Resident[s] cites a stipulated time period of only 3 years of residence for Junior Residents, thereafter they must be promoted as a Senior Resident. Avoiding and evading such promotion is nothing less than exploitation, cheap labor at a lesser price, and lesser designation even as they have a proven record of saving multitudes including those Law Makers.
Postponement of the National Eligibility cum Entrance Test (the most competitive one in India) for Post Graduate aspirants indefinitely, pausing the future of approximately 2,00,000 doctors is eccentric. Final-year medical students are propelled into COVID-19 wards and are rather trapped.
The two biggest obvious errors even in the eyes of a layperson are that the Government is intentionally turning a deaf ear ignoring the dire consequences of not recruiting new doctors, calculatedly preventing inflow of manpower who can in fact save the lives of multitudes, and turning a blind eye to the deaths of doctors in this COVID-19 battle – later crying wolf for lack of doctors and a failed attempt to battle a tsunami of patients, it is rather unsound and ill-considered.
Moreover, there is an evident disparity in stipend amongst Resident Doctors, whilst a Junior Resident Doctor in Tamil Nadu draws 30,000 – 35,000 Indian Rupees, a Junior Resident Doctor in Delhi draws 90,000 – 93,000 Indian Rupees. This is rather undignifying and assassinating the divine services doctors who render tirelessly by risking their very own lives. As suggested by most Residents in their appeal, there is also a pressing need to enact a “Uniform Residential Scheme” across India thus upholding the Constitutional mandate of ‘equality.’
As COVID-19 patients battle their lives inside hospitals their near and dear ones who have no access whatsoever or rather very limited access at homes or outside remain enormously anxious and vexed and are dying within every microsecond. A habitual kind-hearted divine and dear brother Allen Paul Isaac happened to immediately connect me with Doctor. Anand Gnanaraj, a Senior Interventional Cardiologist, Apollo Speciality Hospital, a ‘God-sent Angel,’ brimmed with paramount compassion and care. His tolerance to my disturbance in zero hours, updating a COVID in-patient’s status amidst his most demanding schedule is soul-satisfying. He is the embodiment of empathy and dedication to a total stranger like myself from a foreign land and I have an attitude of gratitude now and forever. In order to ease the burden of burned-out doctors and anxious attendees, there ought to be an automated mechanism deployed to know the well-being/ill-beings of in-patients.
As multitudes struggle to be hospitalized in this pandemic ear, Doctor.M.Saranavan, a Neurosurgeon, has digitized healthcare – ‘a recognized vision of the World Health Organisation,’ enabling certain COVID patients to receive medical care without physically going to a hospital or clinic. In this time of bed crisis, his digital service has come under the spotlight (in this pandemic era) and is very likely to stay.
The State ought to realize the blunder it has been making as it beheads education and strangulates employment! In this time of crisis, both Statesmen and Common-man must stand with them and not against them. Having attended the Global Solutions Summit virtual studio, the opening statement was “no one is safe until all are safe” therefore WE first need to keep our future generation and our frontline warriors safe.
Dottoressa.Maffi, Advocate, holds a degree in law from London, a Legum Magister in Legal Practice from the City University, UK, A Master of Arts in Human Rights, a Legum Magister from United Nations Interregional Crime and Justice Research Institute, Italy, a Certificate in Migration and its link to Peace, Security, and Sustainable Development Agenda from University for Peace, Costa Rica, and a Certificate in Global Governance, University for Peace, Costa Rica.
