Subimal Bhattacharjee shares his lockdown experience from a sealed society in a containment zone

Today, we in India complete one month of lockdown, and I also complete one week of containment as my society has been sealed. While for all, the lockdown has been the necessity to maintain social distancing, for me the key reason for containment is a family in the neighbourhood having eight Covid-19 positive cases.

On 24th March 2020, on the eve of the start of the lockdown, India had 564 positive cases and 11 resulting deaths and after a month it now stands at a whopping 24506 with 775 deaths (till 25 April). Thankfully, this is far lower than those high projected figures that would have happened had the lockdown not been announced or delayed and even not extended from the initial announcement of 21 days by Prime Minister Narendra Modi. The worry is that the upward trend continues, the relief is that many districts across the country are coming out of the red zone. The concern is that many people still violate social distancing norms, the comfort is that a good number of people are utilising this period to rediscover their creative talents. Meanwhile, for the first time in life I wore a facial mask.

When one looks back at the month that has elapsed, it does seem days have gone quite fast despite the change in activities. Staying confined in my home in Delhi, I was also following closely the situation in Assam and Uttar Pradesh as the preparation on a war footing was on. People from different parts of Barak Valley called or reached out via social media to enquire about my well being and also updated on the developments and arrangements back home. Besides the readiness in terms of hospital beds and ICU availability, people also spoke about the hordes of groups venturing out to offer food and charity to downtrodden and many who tried to defy lockdown under frivolous pretext.

Here was a changed routine for most people and there was ample time to devote to oneself and family or even to the community. For others, there was more worrying thinking of the future in the face of the loss of jobs and gainful employment. A changed atmosphere also resulted in many people adapting themselves to the lockdown realities and also life ahead. Suddenly every grocery and food item seemed so precious, frugality became a way of life for most people and most of them started spending more time on the devices trying to discover newer passions and completing long-held dreams. As a society, we all have been discussing how a virus can change the fortune of humanity on this planet, after spreading around in no time. People started saying that Mother Earth was showing her wrath and giving us the message to be more caring for the environment. And of course, dealing with hordes of remedies and health tips often in the form of fake news through petabytes of social media content that refuses to die away. Even Noboborsho on 14 April was a subdued affair with access to non-vegetarian food not there.

My three weeks of lockdown were spent in the most optimal way by all standards. In more than two decades, I was never at home at a stretch for more than a month. A great opportunity to read and write on much wider subjects. Of course indulging in ‘work from home’, the new charm. The globally widespread nature of the pandemic resulted in contacts with so many past colleagues and friends in more than 20 countries, and it was a very good chance to catch up with everyone after a long time. More relieving that everyone was safe and a few of them being also in New York, Milan and Madrid, three of my favourite cities.

I stepped out of the house twice to refill the essentials and realised that while we are sincerely following the lockdown, for others it was life as usual with car rides and walks even in main roads. I could even see a neighbour’s car moving out five times a day without understanding what a garment exporter had to do ‘essential’ in these days. More people spoke on the phone than before and everyone had one question- how long will this last and what would be life after we reopen. Even television viewing increased in terms of attentive moments and one could do a comparison among what was being done in New York or New Delhi or Guwahati or even Silchar to mitigate the situation. At times, even the competitive camera clicking and posing folks distributing rice and essentials was a sad specter in these times of misfortune.

Lockdown also brought me to many webinars and video conferencing calls beyond my subjects of work or call but it was such a quality experience to hear from others how they felt like in these times and people sharing how would life and business look like post the lockdown. With very poor data connectivity at home and no time to invest in another data network, it was fun to see distorted pictures and distuned voices in those sessions. I’ve had the fortune of being in sessions with business leaders and entrepreneurs, defense honchos, cybersecurity professionals, health workers, university faculties and folk artists. These sessions require lots of concentration much more even than live television discussions where you get breathing time. But here one has to be more attentive and also careful not to do too many movements as people can be judgemental across the networks, many of whom are meeting you for the first time in these screen sessions.

As fake news and privacy violations were rummaging through the web, I did many focussed televisions shows in national media and also a couple of global media interviews. Almost all of them were confined to a ZOOM or WebEx or Skype session, except two sessions with national broadcaster where I went to their studio and were fantastic and very well received due to their wide audience and repeat telecast. The last of these shows was just the Friday before my confinement session started the following day. It was a different Delhi that I saw as I was driven to and from the studio: roads empty, no horns blowing, skies clean. As I came to Connaught Place around 10:30 pm, I realised that besides policemen and delivery boys around some food outlets, not a soul was there as the avenue and promenade glowed in the lights and clean air. Everything was somber and one of the policemen on duty told me that in his one year of posting in this vicinity, he hasn’t seen Fridays pass by like this. I wrote my pieces and chapters comfortably by the lawns enjoying the greenery in the still cool spring of mid-April. Early morning and late evening, when everyone was away, I did my walks in one of the society lawns, enforcing my own sense of social distancing norm. Life was definitely good.

But not when it moved to the containment phase beginning 18 April. Living next to the lieutenant governor of Delhi, the chief minister and his ministers, one would have thought that life would still be easy but not even by bringing to the notice of the area deputy commissioner. It became an issue in procuring essentials unless one had to fall prey to non-conforming quality and reckless cost of such item from cart welding vendors. Despite the DC’s note in the containment order “SDM Civil Lines and SHO, PS, Civil Lines are further directed not to allow the residents of the aforesaid area to move out of their houses and to ensure door to door supply of essential commodities in aforesaid cordon off the area, in coordination with market associations or by any other appropriate mechanism for uninterrupted supply of essential commodities”, alas nothing was undertaken. After five days of this no attention phase, I wrote to the DC, and yet there is no action. So we have to depend on the goodwill of the friends who live in the vicinity and one of our staff who luckily was outside the compound when the sealing was done to go and run errands and get us the stuff. So much for help and support from a government that claims to be an Aam Aadmi Government. The matter doesn’t end here either- the staff who goes to some of the shops around and also the milk booth of Mother Dairy faces stigma that he has come from Oberoi apartments and is told to stay away. And all this when the DC orders ‘door to door supply of essential commodities’ and ‘in coordination with market associations’. And this happens right in the national capital in less than a kilometer of the residence of the lieutenant governor, the chief minister, and his ministers.

Notwithstanding this fate that one has to unfortunately experience, having been confined to home had still not become a boring exercise. Even sleeping hours have increased. The same pursuits of reading, writing and screen sessions continue. With no vehicular horns, chirping of birds fills almost the day to feel cheerful and keep positive thinking. Meanwhile, social media gets filled with more trash as ever and warning sessions for many rural folks in Assam and the northeast gets busier. Corporates and teachers call to check if Zoom is still safe or they should look at other options. People call from far and wide or even leave a social media message for remaining safe and indoors- some even think I could be traveling still now. The virtual office functions via video and web and newer ideas cross the mind to be able to do something meaningful for these times. Field staff caught in their areas also remain cheerful and committed as they also offer ideas post the Covid-19 life.

Humans are social animals and always like to engage and will still engage. Maybe we are meant to change- not that this pandemic is forcing that but our own habits over the years. Digital lifestyle is changing human interactions- more remotely and via devices than actual personal touch. Even neighbours WhatsApp and talk today rather than opening the door and talk face to face. Covid-19 has possibly given a different dimension to this phenomenon- it will prolong and give a more footing to such behaviour. At the emotional level, such behaviours often mismatch and remain disjointed, that’s also something that society will be riddled with. At the same time, health and hygiene consciousness will increase further which definitely is a good development unless it also takes some paranoid turn in some places.

Needless to say, this period has opened up a much wider vista for many: to be able to reflect on life and its many nuances and focus on a path ahead. Many have become like machines right from the morning wake up to the recourse to bed at night and all day servicing a job around defined processes and steps. These few days have given a chance for many to look at life more closely into its meaningful values. After all, it is one life that everyone lives.

Eight years back I had taken a call to live a life as I want and not be drawn to the rat race. In spite of that work and responsibilities still drags one to some sort of extended work schedule. The focus to do things that one aspires and yet falls short of time and motivation has been the yardstick. Thus one became a sort of jack of all trades and just master in one. These lockdown and subsequently containment days were a good time to reflect back on the motivations and desire to lead a peaceful life where one worked to one’s satisfaction and stayed away from competitive pushes and aspirations that one sees these days often by means foul than by fair. In spite of what has befallen on humanity, Covid-19 has been a great lesson in many ways- it doesn’t discriminate between a rich or a poor or a white from a black or a man from a woman. Hardships have been caused this but the message is clear- let us not discriminate and let us all unite to fight this menace. Meanwhile the number of infected by Covid-19 still continues to grow in Delhi.

The author is a globally recognised commentator on cyberspace issues and former country head of General Dynamics. He is the founder and director of JOOKTO, an organisation that works in supporting and connecting underprivileged across sectors.