On Sunday, India hit a rather unwelcome benchmark by becoming the first country in the world to report over 80k new COVID-19 cases in a single day. That said, the coronavirus pandemic has been normalised enough in the country to completely brush off the massive spike as an everyday activity now. But, were we ever really scared of COVID-19 in the first place?
Irrespective of the pandemic’s severity, Indians have time and again proved their disregard for life in the past six months or so. We have witnessed exasperating instances of people throwing care and precautions to reckless abandon and thronging streets as if social distancing was nobody’s business.
From big fat elaborate weddings to anti-corona marches (yes!!!), literally everything stupid that could have happened to flout the social distancing rules has legit happened. And here’s a roundup of all the times when COVID-19 had to wait for us to get done with whatever weird shit we were up to. Scroll through:
It All Started With The ‘Go Corona’ Marches
You can tell that a country is doomed during a pandemic by looking at how its leaders and politicians react to the crisis. In India’s case, we had MLAs like Ramdas Athawale and Raja Sing organising ‘Go Corona Go’ and ‘Chinese Virus Go Back’ marches respectively complete with huge gatherings of people most of whom showed up sans any masks. What a genius way of disregarding socialn distancing and tackling a deadly virus, seriously!
Bengal Ram Navami
In India, we have long associated disrupted pujas with ghor anartha. Now, this probable anartha turned out to be a way bigger scare than the novel coronavirus for people in Bengal who thronged the streets before Ram temples in the state to offer prayers on Ram Navami. This happened back in April when the lockdown had just started and was immediately flouted first to congest daily markets in Bengal for the festival preparations and then to offer prayers.
When People Launched Rallies For First Line Workers (To Their Very Horrors Of Course)
Right before the very first lockdown in the country, a Janta curfew was observed on March 22nd and as part of it people were asked to take five minutes and thank the frontline warriors in the country by either clapping, or ringing bells, and blowing conches. Now, to say that the country went absolutely overboard with the task would be an understatement. As part of the gratitude exercise, people literally gathered together and conducted marches. Did that drive away corona though? Nope! Did we look stupid? Absolutely!
Heights of utter #stupidity pic.twitter.com/QQckpyK4dP
— Mack Da EviL DeshBhakt (@Aliitweeter) March 23, 2020
When People Decided To Be Ignorantly Selective About The Pandemic Scare
Back in April, some Ranchi residents bunched up and took to the streets in huge numbers for a highly ironic endeavour. Guess what that can be? Their fear of contracting coronavirus from a dead patient who was buried in a local graveyard! All of this while they casually disregarded social distancing!
When We Had An Impromptu Diwali
On April 5th, the PM gave Indians yet another task. This time we were to light candles and torches as a sign of solidarity. ‘Don’t leave your houses,’ he specified but we were certainly too pumped up to comply. What followed was a legit Diwali, house fires, and of course, marches and rallies ‘coz khaali baithe hain kya karein?
When Getting Sloshed And Forgetting About COVID-19 Looked Like An Amazing Idea
On May 3, it was announced by the government that liquor stores across the nation will be allowed to re-open in all zones, keeping social distancing in mind. Also, no more than five people at a time in a store. But with stores being shut for over 40 days, it seemed like people couldn’t care less about social distancing. As soon as the liquor stores opened their shutters, kilometre-long queues were seen around them, with cops having to resort to lathi charge to disperse the crowd at certain locations.
When A Big Fat Wedding Was More Important Than The Groom’s Life
Throughout the lockdown, a lot of wedding organisers were penalised for inviting more guests than the specified guest list. In one of the more severe instances, a Patna groom died and 95 others contracted the virus while attending a big fat wedding which had over 350 people in attendance. Reports also suggested that the groom was already very sick, had COVID-19 symptoms even before the wedding, and was still taken to a village quake instead of a proper doctor.
When Every Mumbaikar Turned Into A Fitness Freak
Right after the first phase of Unlock in the country, it all looked like Mumbaikers decided that they had had enough of sitting home and decided to take a walk on Marine Drive. The pictures were unbelievable!
When We Had Jammed Roads During The Pandemic
Right after the Marine Drive fiasco, heavy traffic was reported on both Delhi and Mumbai roads. In fact, some of the prominent roads in the cities also ended up being jammed while people literally pushed through crowds to catch office buses.
Well, sounds like most of us like to follow social distancing rules as long as we are made to. It’s sad that even our own lives are not motivation enough to understand that social distancing is necessary, mass gatherings are downright stupid, and unlocking the country is an economic necessity.
Now as Unlock 4.0 goes live tomorrow, one can only hope that people understand the gravity of the situation and the fact that the coronavirus very much prevails and continues to expand its reach.
Featured Image: Instagram
