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For the poor in a highly densely populated country like India, social distancing is a privilege. They don’t know which is a bigger killer: the novel coronavirus or the hunger which has been thrust upon them due to an unprecedented crisis. According to Firstpost: for lower-income groups, including stranded migrant workers, daily wage earners starvation remains a real and immediate problem.
For context, these are the workers that live on wages of $30 per month, and even that amount has now become impossible to secure due to the lockdown imposed as a result of the Coronavirus.
A report in the Print stated (as of April 11) that 53 deaths were caused by exhaustion, hunger, denial of medical care, or suicides due to lack of food or livelihood. The fact remains, however, that most of these case go unreported, or are dismissed by authorities as non-hunger deaths.
For those who haven't succumbed to death from starvation yet, there is the anxiety of what the cause of their passing would be. For some, it is the pressure of providing for their family, for others, it is the deplorable quality of their current living situation.
The United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) estimates at least 17,500 Rohingyas registered as refugees in India. With no water reportedly coming in since December 2019, they are forced to drink from a borewell and share unhygienic toilets and facilities.
The mass exodus of workers over the last few weeks has also been triggered by potential starvation where they once worked. The harrowing truth, however, remains that there is no hope once they return home too.
The government has implemented several schemes to aid those in financial distress at this point. However, these deaths are evidence of a clear impasse between passing an order and implementing it. Life for India's poor is now a game of chance, waiting to see if it's sickness or starvation that gets them first.
The situation keeps getting worse with each passing day. Therefore, I am collaborating with TUF India and Kheyti, organizations working on the ground in India, to raise money to provide food supplies to these vulnerable populations, with the hopes to prevent deaths from starvation.
For context, these are the workers that live on wages of $30 per month, and even that amount has now become impossible to secure due to the lockdown imposed as a result of the Coronavirus.
A report in the Print stated (as of April 11) that 53 deaths were caused by exhaustion, hunger, denial of medical care, or suicides due to lack of food or livelihood. The fact remains, however, that most of these case go unreported, or are dismissed by authorities as non-hunger deaths.
For those who haven't succumbed to death from starvation yet, there is the anxiety of what the cause of their passing would be. For some, it is the pressure of providing for their family, for others, it is the deplorable quality of their current living situation.
The United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) estimates at least 17,500 Rohingyas registered as refugees in India. With no water reportedly coming in since December 2019, they are forced to drink from a borewell and share unhygienic toilets and facilities.
The mass exodus of workers over the last few weeks has also been triggered by potential starvation where they once worked. The harrowing truth, however, remains that there is no hope once they return home too.
The government has implemented several schemes to aid those in financial distress at this point. However, these deaths are evidence of a clear impasse between passing an order and implementing it. Life for India's poor is now a game of chance, waiting to see if it's sickness or starvation that gets them first.
The situation keeps getting worse with each passing day. Therefore, I am collaborating with TUF India and Kheyti, organizations working on the ground in India, to raise money to provide food supplies to these vulnerable populations, with the hopes to prevent deaths from starvation.