Power tussle amid pandemic : Enacting buffoonery
- The Sangai Express Editorial :: June 26 2020 -

Highly contagious and it has also proved fatal in many cases. Manipur is just 8 short of the four figure mark, as on June 24, and the manner in which it reached the figure of 992 underlines how fast the virus can spread.

Back in April, more precisely on April 19, the State Government had maintained that there was no active COVID-19 cases in Manipur, with the first two patients having already recovered.

But that did not mean that the virus had been neutralised and spread fast it did.

On June 1 the number of infected stood at 81 cases.

On June 24, that number had zoomed to 992.

This meant that Manipur has witnessed a jump of about 35 fresh cases each day from June 1 to June 24.

And the number will continue to rise with so many others lined up to return to Manipur in the next couple of days, by air, by train and by road too.

Fortunately for Manipur, there has been no death case due to COVID-19 so far, but how long will this continue is anybody’s guess.

Assam has already 11 deaths followed by Meghalaya, Tripura and Arunachal Pradesh with one death each.

The number of death is not alarming, but the spread of the virus certainly is and if extra efforts are not taken, anything can happen for the worst and this is where utmost caution and care need to be taken by the Government and its agencies.

In a way it is tragic, but it is amid the tension triggered by the virus that one saw the political jamboree just a few days back and this is likely to continue in the coming days too.

The NPP, with four MLAs which walked out of the alliance just a few days back is today back in the alliance, but this does not mean that everything is hunky dory.

So far no one seems to know the pound of flesh that has been extracted or put on demand for the NPP to return to the coalition but doubtful if it could be anything to do with the interests of the people.

Tug of war in the midst of a pandemic and nothing could be more farcical than this. The reality is scary.

With the lockdown still on, with more than half the normal trades yet to resume, the attention of the political parties in the Government should have been on how to revive the economy of the land.

There is as yet no sign that the Ima Keithels would be opened any day and remember the said Keithels were closed on March 22, ahead of the National lockdown that was clamped on March 25.

Passenger vehicles which ply on the Imphal-Dimapur-Guwahati-Shillong route have been off the road since March.

Auto-rickshaws which ferry passengers from one place to the other are yet to resume service.

Shops are yet to open fully. Many of the small time leikai and leirak tea stalls are yet to open.

Hotels and restaurants are still closed and take aways cannot replace the business of opening the eateries.

Schools are yet to open and already there is a stand off over the announcement of the Government that private school teachers should be paid their salaries from April to June and students need not pay their fees.

School vans are also yet to resume service.

Tuition and coaching classes are closed.

All these should have pricked the minds of the political leaders and they should have come together to sincerely study how to put back on track these small time ventures but which feed a huge number of families and meet the expenses of their school and college going children.

The drama is enough. The people are fed up of the buffoonery that has been enacted.