Modi has led a high-profile campaign to create a regional response to the COVID-19 crisis. On March 15, Modi convened a teleconference of the South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation (SAARC) to create a corona virus emergency fund and exchange medical information. On March 26, Modi expanded the effort to draw in the G-20, an international forum of wealthy governments and banks that includes the European Union.
But there is suspicion that Modi's regional and international efforts have more to do with repairing his government's reputation than confronting the health crisis.
Modi's unilateral seizure of Jammu and Kashmir in violation of the Indian constitution -- and subsequent crackdown on any and all opposition to the takeover -- was widely condemned internationally. The recent move by the Modi government to redefine "citizenship" in a way that excludes Muslims has also been widely criticized. The United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights, Michelle Bachelet, called the law a violation of several international agreements that India is a party too.
There has been scant follow through with the SAARC or the G-20, and the government has done little at home. India's public health system is fragile at the best of times, with only 0.5 hospital beds for every 1,000 people. In contrast, Italy has almost seven times that figure.
One important independent outlet reporting on the Covid-19 crisis has been Rural India Online, part of the People's Archive of Rural India (PARI), a network of reporters and photojournalists who report on India's rural dwellers who make up 70 percent of the population.
P.Sainath, PARI's founder and editorial winner of the prestigious Ramon Magsaysay Award and Amnesty International's Global Award for Human Rights -- is sharply critical of the Modi government's actions, and PARI's reporters have covered what the mainstream media has been intimidated from reporting: the massive number of poor who have taken to the roads to return home, cancer patients sleeping outside of hospitals in the hope of getting treatment, and day laborers who cannot afford to miss any work. One told PARI reporter Shraddha Agarwal, "Soap won't save us if we die of hunger first."
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