World
Cases rise, pressure grows on Modi to impose strict lockdown
With coronavirus cases still surging to record levels, Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi is facing growing pressure to impose a harsh nationwide lockdown amid a debate whether restrictions imposed by individual states are enough.
Many medical experts, opposition leaders and some of the Supreme Court judges have suggested the lockdown seems to be the only option with the virus raging in cities and towns, where hospitals are forced to turn patients away while relatives scramble to find oxygen. Crematoriums and burial grounds are struggling to handle the dead.
Also Read:Harris’ family in India grapples with COVID
On Friday, India recorded a new record of 414,188 confirmed cases in the past 24 hours, Its tally has risen to more than 21.4 million since the pandemic began with faint hopes of the curve going down quickly. The Health Ministry also reported 3,915 additional deaths, bringing the total to 234,083. Experts believe both figures are an undercount.
The official daily death count has stayed over 3,000 for the past 10 days.
Over the past month, nearly a dozen out of India’s 28 federal states have announced less stringent restrictions than the nationwide lockdown imposed for two months in March last year.
Modi, who held consultations with top elected leaders and officials of the worst-hit states on Thursday, has so far left the responsibility for fighting the virus to poorly equipped state governments.
Dr. Randeep Guleria, a government health expert, said a complete, aggressive lockdown is needed in India just like last year, especially in areas where more than 10% of those tested have contracted COVID-19.
Srinath Reddy, president of the Public Health Foundation of India, a public-private consultancy, acknowledged that different states were experiencing different intensities of the epidemic, but said a “coordinated countrywide strategy” was still needed.
According to Reddy, decisions need to be based on local conditions but should be closely coordinated by the center. “Like an orchestra which plays the same sheet music but with different instruments,” he said.
Anthony Fauci, President Joe Biden’s chief medical adviser, also suggested that a complete shutdown in India may be needed two to four weeks to help ease the surge of infections.
Also Read:India's govt eases hospital oxygen shortage as demand jumps
“As soon as the cases start coming down, you can vaccinate more people and get ahead of the trajectory of the outbreak of the pandemic,” Fauci said in an interview with the Indian television CNN News18 news channel on Thursday. He did not provide specifics of what a shutdown should entail.
He said it appears there are at least two types of virus variants circulating in India. He said B117, which is the U.K. variant, tends to be concentrated in New Delhi and that the 617 variant is concentrated in the worst-hit western Maharashtra state.
“Both of those have increasing capability of transmitting better and more efficiently than the original Wuhan strain a year ago,” Fauci said.
Modi imposed a two-month stringent lockdown last year on four hours’ notice. It stranded tens of millions of migrant workers who were left jobless and fled to villages with many dying along the way. Experts say the decision helped contain the virus and bought time for the government.
India’s economy contracted by 23% in April-June quarter last year and showed recovery as the restrictions were eased. The International Monetary Fund’s projection of 12.5% growth in 2021-22 financial year, beginning April, is expected to suffer again with the surge in infections.
Modi’s policy of selected lockdowns is being supported by some experts, including Vineeta Bal, a scientist at the National Institute of Immunology. She said different states have different needs, and local particularities need to be taken into account for any policy to work.
In most instances, in places where health infrastructure and expertise are good, localized restrictions at the level of a state, or even a district, are a better way to curb the spread of infections, said Bal. “A centrally mandated lockdown will just be inappropriate,” she said.
Also Read:India receives 10,000 vials of Remdisivir from Bangladesh
Dr. Yogesh Jain Ganiyari of the Peoples Health Support Group, a low-cost public health program in the central state of Chhattisgarh, said that scientifically, lockdowns are the most effective way of curbing infections.
“But we don’t live in a lab. We need to take into account the humanitarian aspect,” said Ganiyari. “Those who look at lockdowns just as disease control mechanisms are heartless. You have to think about the people.”
Sheriff: Girl shoots 3 at Idaho school; teacher disarms her
A sixth-grade girl brought a gun to her Idaho middle school, shot and wounded two students and a custodian and then was disarmed by a teacher Thursday, authorities said.
The three victims were shot in their limbs and expected to survive, officials said at a news conference. Jefferson County Sheriff Steve Anderson says the girl pulled a handgun from her backpack and fired multiple rounds inside and outside Rigby Middle School in the small city of Rigby, about 95 miles (145 kilometers) southwest of Yellowstone National Park.
Also Read:2 killed in shooting at Wisconsin casino; gunman slain
A female teacher disarmed the girl and held her until law enforcement arrived and took her into custody, authorities said, without giving other details. Authorities say they’re investigating the motive for the attack and where the girl got the gun.
“We don’t have a lot of details at this time of ‘why’ — that is being investigated,” Anderson said. “We’re following all leads.”
The girl is from the nearby city of Idaho Falls, Anderson said. He didn’t release her name.
Police were called to the school around 9:15 a.m. after students and staffers heard gunfire. Multiple law enforcement agencies responded, and students were evacuated to a nearby high school to be reunited with their parents.
“Me and my classmate were just in class with our teacher — we were doing work — and then all of a sudden, here was a loud noise and then there were two more loud noises. Then there was screaming,” 12-year-old Yandel Rodriguez said. “Our teacher went to check it out, and he found blood.”
Yandel’s mom, Adela Rodriguez, said they were OK but “still a little shaky” from the shooting as they left the campus.
Both of the students who were shot were being held at the hospital, and one of them might need surgery, said Dr. Michael Lemon, trauma medical director at Eastern Idaho Regional Medical Center.
Still, both students were in fair condition and could be released as early as Friday. One of the students had wounds in two limbs and might have been shot twice, he said.
“It’s an absolute blessing” that they weren’t hurt worse, Lemon said. The adult was treated and released for a bullet wound that went through an extremity, the doctor said.
Schools would be closed districtwide to give students time to be with their families, and counselors would be available starting Friday, said Jefferson School District Superintendent Chad Martin.
“This is the worst nightmare a school district could ever face. We prepare for it,” Martin said, “but you’re never truly prepared.”
Police tape surrounded the school, which has about 1,500 students in sixth through eighth grades, and small evidence markers were placed next to spots of blood on the ground.
“I am praying for the lives and safety of those involved in today’s tragic events,” Gov. Brad Little said in a statement. “Thank you to our law enforcement agencies and school leaders for their efforts in responding to the incident.”
Lucy Long, a sixth-grader at Rigby Middle School, told the Post Register newspaper in Idaho Falls that her classroom went into lockdown after they heard gunshots, with lights and computers turned off and students lined up against the wall.
Lucy comforted her friends and began recording on her phone, so police would know what happened if the shooter came in. The audio contained mostly whispers, with one sentence audible: “It’s real,” one student said.
Lucy said she saw blood on the hallway floor when police escorted them out of the classroom.
Also Read:Police: FedEx shooter legally bought guns used in shooting
Jefferson County Prosecutor Mark Taylor said decisions about criminal charges wouldn’t be made until the investigation is complete but that they might include three counts of attempted murder.
The attack appears to be Idaho’s second school shooting. In 1999, a student at a high school in Notus fired a shotgun several times. No one was struck by the gunfire, but one student was injured by ricocheting debris from the first shell.
In 1989, a student at Rigby Junior High pulled a gun, threatened a teacher and students, and took a 14-year-old girl hostage, according to a Deseret News report. Police safely rescued the hostage from a nearby church about an hour later and took the teen into custody. No one was shot in that incident.
Harris’ family in India grapples with COVID
G. Balachandran turned 80 this spring — a milestone of a birthday in India, where he lives. If not for the coronavirus pandemic, he would have been surrounded by family members who gathered to celebrate with him.
But with the virus ravaging his homeland, Balachandran had to settle for congratulatory phone calls. Including one from his rather famous niece: Vice President Kamala Harris.
“Unfortunately, because of the COVID, I cannot have such an elaborate function,” the retired academic said in a Zoom interview Thursday from his home in New Delhi.
Harris’ uncle says he spoke with the vice president and her husband, Doug Emhoff, for quite a while. To close out the conversation, Harris assured him she’d take care of his daughter — her cousin — who lives in Washington.
“Don’t worry, Uncle. I’ll take care of your daughter. I talk to her quite a lot,” Balachandran recalls Harris telling him in their March conversation.
It was the last time they had a chance to speak. Since then, the coronavirus has raged out of control in India, overwhelming the nation’s health care system and killing hundreds of thousands of people.
While the crisis in India has created diplomatic and humanitarian challenges for the Biden administration, for Harris it is also personal: Her mother was born there, and she’s spoken emotionally throughout her political career about the influence of her many visits to India as a child.
On Friday, she’s set to deliver remarks at a State Department event focused on the effort to combat COVID-19 in India, and she’s expected to express U.S. solidarity with the nation.
Speaking at a fundraiser for the Indian nongovernmental organization Pratham in 2018, Harris talked about walking hand-in-hand with her grandfather, P.V. Gopalan, and listening to him speak with friends about the importance of a free and equal democracy.
“It was those walks on the beach with my grandfather on Besant Nagar that have had a profound impact on who I am today,” she said.
She spoke often on the campaign trail about her late mother, Shyamala Gopalan, a headstrong and resilient woman who bucked tradition and decided to leave India to pursue a career as a scientist at the University of California, Berkeley.
And during her acceptance speech at the 2020 Democratic National Convention, Harris opened her speech with a shout-out to her “chithis” — a Tamil word for aunt. One of those chithis, Sarala Gopalan, is a retired obstetrician who lives in Chennai.
As a child, Harris used to visit India every other year. Now all that remains of her extended family there are her aunt and uncle. Another Indian-born aunt lives in Canada.
Balachandran said that while he used to hear about friends of friends getting the virus, now it’s hitting close to home. Those he knows personally or worked with are getting the virus, and some are dying.
“The conditions are pretty bad in India,” he said.
Balachandran considers himself one of the lucky ones, as he’s retired and largely stays home alone, leaving only occasionally for groceries, so that “nobody can infect me other than myself.”
His sister Sarala is the same, he says, and has largely isolated herself in her apartment in Chennai to avoid exposure. Both are fully vaccinated, something he knows is a luxury in India, which has suffered from a severe vaccine shortage.
That shortage is part of what prompted criticism in India of what many saw as an initially lackluster U.S. response to a humanitarian crisis unfolding in the nation over the past month. The U.S. initially refused to lift a ban on exports of vaccine manufacturing supplies, drawing sharp criticism from some Indian leaders.
When COVID-19 cases in India started to spin out of control in April, there were calls for other countries — particularly the U.S. — to get involved. While a number of countries, including Germany, Saudi Arabia and even India’s traditional foe Pakistan, offered support and supplies, U.S. leaders were seen as dragging their feet on the issue.
The White House had previously emphasized the $1.4 billion in health assistance provided to India to help with pandemic preparedness and said when asked that it was in discussions about offering aid.
The delay in offering further aid was seen as putting a strain on long-standing close diplomatic relations between the two nations, and on April 25, after receiving scrutiny over the U.S. response, a number of top U.S. officials publicly offered further support and supplies to the nation — including a tweet and a call to Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi from President Joe Biden himself.
Harris’ niece in California, Meena Harris, has retweeted a half-dozen accounts calling for more aid to India, including one from climate activist Greta Thunberg admonishing the global community to “step up and immediately offer assistance.”
Harris’ office declined to comment for this article.
The U.S. announced it would lift the export ban on vaccine manufacturing supplies and said it would send personal protective equipment, oxygen supplies, antivirals and other aid to India to help the nation combat the virus.
The administration gets no criticism from S.V. Ramanan, a temple administrator of the Shri Dharma Sastha Temple in Harris’ Indian grandfather’s hometown Thulasendrapuram in Southern Tamil Nadu state, 215 miles (350 kilometers) from the coastal city of Chennai.
“Everyone has their priorities. America also passed through something similar and we helped then. Now they are helping us,” he said.
Ramanan added that he didn’t expect that having Harris as vice president fast-tracked aid to India or that it somehow meant help should have come earlier, adding: “I think in general all other countries should help, and I’m glad the U.S. has stepped up.”
He hopes Harris can make a visit to her ancestral village when things are better.
While Harris has embraced her Indian heritage as part of her political profile, in responding to the crisis there she’s been careful to speak from the perspective of a vice president rather than an Indian American worried about her family’s safety.
“We are all part of a world community. And to the extent that any of us, as human beings who have any level of compassion, see suffering anywhere around the world, it impacts all of us. You know, it impacts us all,” she told reporters last week in Ohio.
A ban on travel to and from the country was announced that day. Harris said only that she hadn’t spoken to her family since the ban was announced.
And G. Balachandran, Harris’ uncle, doesn’t fault his niece for how the U.S. response has played out.
He said that, knowing Kamala, “she would have done all that she can in order to expedite the matter.”
For now, he’s content with the occasional phone call from his niece. When the two talk, it’s mostly about family; he doesn’t share much about current affairs in India because, he joked, “she’s got a whole embassy that’s sending her cables every hour on all of India!”
But he does hope to visit the vice president’s residence in Washington at the Naval Observatory when he can travel again. Balachandran said he’d like to meet Biden again and remind him that the last time they met was when Biden was vice president and swore in Harris as a U.S. senator.
“I wish we could all be together at the same time,” he said of the extended family, “but that’s a big wish to look for at this moment.”
At least 25 dead during Brazilian police raid in Rio
Police targeting drug traffickers raided a slum in Rio de Janeiro on Thursday and at least one officer and two dozen others died after being shot, authorities said.
The civil police’s press office confirmed the death of the cop and 24 alleged “criminals” in a message to the Associated Press.
A police helicopter flew low over the Jacarezinho favela as heavily armed men fled police by leaping from roof to roof, according to images shown on local television.
Also read: Grim list of deaths at police hands grows even after verdict
One woman told The Associated Press she saw police kill a badly wounded man she described as helpless and unarmed who they found after he had fled into her house.
Felipe Curi, a detective in Rio’s civil police, denied there had been any executions. “There were no suspects killed. They were all traffickers or criminals who tried to take the lives of our police officers and there was no other alternative,” he said during a press conference.
Police had to struggle to enter the favela because of concrete barriers built by the criminals, according to the detective. Shooting spread throughout the community. During the operation, several people Curi described as criminals invaded neighboring houses trying to hide. Six were arrested, he said.
The police also seized 16 pistols, six rifles, a submachine gun, 12 grenades and a shotgun.
Service on a subway line was temporarily suspended “due to intense shooting in the region,” according to a statement from the company that operates it. Earlier, two subway passengers were injured when a stray bullet shattered the glass of one car.
Jacarezinho, one of the city’s most populous favelas, with some 40,000 residents, is dominated by the Comando Vermelho, one of Brazil’s leading criminal organizations. The police consider Jacarezinho to be one of the group’s headquarters.
Thursday’s operation was aimed at investigating the recruitment of teenagers to hijack trains and commit other crimes, police said in a statement.
Also read: 1 verdict, then 6 police killings across America in 24 hours
A group of about 50 residents in Jacarezinho poured into a narrow street on Thursday afternoon to follow members of the state legislature’s human rights commission as it conducted an inspection. They shouted “justice” while clapping their hands and some raised their right fists into the air.
Human Rights Watch Brazil said in a statement that the public prosecutor must immediately investigate possible police abuses.
The police statement said the criminal gang has a “warlike structure of soldiers equipped with rifles, grenades, bulletproof vests, pistols, camouflaged clothing and other military accessories.”
The Candido Mendes University’s Public Safety Observatory said that at least 12 police operations in Rio state this year have resulted in three or more deaths.
Observatory director Silvia Ramos said Thursday’s raid was among the deadliest in the city’s recent history.
Many of them appear to violate a ruling by Brazil’s Supreme Court last year that ordered the police to suspend operations during the pandemic, restricting them to “absolutely exceptional” situations.
The Supreme Court declined to comment when asked by The Associated Press if Thursday’s operation would qualify.
Rio police killed an average of more than five people a day during the first quarter of 2021, the most lethal start of a year since the state government began regularly releasing such data more than two decades ago, according to the Observatory.
More support easing vaccine patent rules, but hurdles remain
Several world leaders Thursday praised the U.S. call to remove patent protections on COVID-19 vaccines to help poor countries obtain shots. But the proposal faces a multitude of hurdles, including resistance from the pharmaceutical industry.
Nor is it clear what effect such a step might have on the campaign to vanquish the outbreak.
Activists and humanitarian institutions cheered after the U.S. reversed course Wednesday and called for a waiver of intellectual property protections on the vaccine. The decision ultimately is up to the 164-member World Trade Organization, and if just one country votes against a waiver, the proposal will fail.
The Biden administration announcement made the U.S. the first country in the developed world with big vaccine manufacturing to publicly support the waiver idea floated by India and South Africa in October. On Thursday, French President Emmanuel Macron embraced it as well.
“I completely favor this opening up of the intellectual property,” Macron said at a vaccine center.
However, like many pharmaceutical companies, Macron insisted that a waiver would not solve the problem of access to vaccines. He said manufacturers in places like Africa are not now equipped to make COVID-19 vaccines, so donations of shots from wealthier countries should be given priority instead.
Pfizer, Moderna, Johnson & Johnson and AstraZeneca — all companies with licensed COVID-19 vaccines — had no immediate comment, though Moderna has long said it will not pursue rivals for patent infringement during the pandemic.
Also read: US tribe shares vaccine with relatives, neighbors in Canada
U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken underscored the urgency of moving fast now.
“On the current trajectory, if we don’t do more, if the entire world doesn’t do more, the world won’t be vaccinated until 2024,” he said in an interview with NBC while visiting Ukraine.
India, as expected, welcomed the move. Australian Prime Minister Scott Morrison called the U.S. position “great news.”
Italian Foreign Minister Luigi Di Maio wrote on Facebook that the U.S. announcement was “a very important signal” and that the world needs “free access” to vaccine patents. But Italian Premier Mario Draghi was more circumspect.
Russian President Vladimir Putin said his country would support it. U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres welcomed the U.S. decision too.
But German Chancellor Angela Merkel’s office spoke out against it, saying: “The protection of intellectual property is a source of innovation and must remain so in the future.”
Also read: US support behind vaccine patent waiver ‘monumental moment’ in Covid fight: WHO
A Merkel spokeswoman, speaking on customary condition of anonymity, said Germany is focused instead on how to increase vaccine manufacturers’ production capacity.
In Brazil, one of the deadliest COVID-19 hot spots in the world, Health Minister Marcelo Queiroga said he fears that the country does not have the means to produce vaccines and that the lifting of patent protections could interfere with Brazil’s efforts to buy doses from pharmaceutical companies.
In closed-door talks at the WTO in recent months, Australia, Britain, Canada, the European Union, Japan, Norway, Singapore and the United States opposed the waiver idea, according to a Geneva-based trade official who was not authorized the discuss the matter and spoke on condition of anonymity.
Some 80 countries, mostly developing ones, have supported the proposal, the official said. China and Russia — two other major COVID-19 vaccine makers — didn’t express a position but were open to further discussion, the official said.
EU Commission President Ursula von der Leyen said the 27-nation bloc is ready to talk about the idea, but she remained noncommittal and emphasized that the EU has been exporting vaccines widely — while the U.S. has not.
EU leaders said the bloc may discuss the matter at a summit that starts Friday.
Also read: US backs waiving intellectual property rules on vaccines
The pharmaceutical industry has argued that a waiver will do more harm than good in the long run.
Easing patent protections would eat into their profits, potentially reducing the incentives that push companies to innovate and make the kind of tremendous leaps they did with the COVID-19 vaccines, which have been churned out at a blistering, unprecedented pace.
The industry has contended, too, that production of the vaccines is complicated and can’t be ramped up simply by easing patent rights. Instead, it has said that reducing snarls in supply chains and shortages of ingredients is a more pressing issue.
The industry has insisted that a faster solution would be for rich countries to share their vaccine stockpiles with poorer ones.
“A waiver is the simple but the wrong answer to what is a complex problem,” said the International Federation of Pharmaceutical Manufacturers and Associations. “Waiving patents of COVID-19 vaccines will not increase production nor provide practical solutions needed to battle this global health crisis.”
Intellectual property law expert Shyam Balganesh, a professor at Columbia University, said a waiver would only go so far because of bottlenecks in the manufacturing and distribution of vaccines.
Also read: EU medicine regulator starts rolling review of Sinovac COVID-19 vaccine
Backers of the waiver say that expanded production by the big pharmaceutical companies and donations from richer countries to poor ones won’t be enough, and that there are manufacturers standing by that could make the vaccines if given the blueprints.
“A waiver of patents for #COVID19 vaccines & medicines could change the game for Africa, unlocking millions more vaccine doses & saving countless lives,” World Health Organization Africa chief Matshidiso Moeti tweeted.
Just over 20 million vaccine doses have been administered across the African continent, which has 1.3 billion people.
There is precedent: In 2003, WTO members agreed to waive patent rights and allow poorer countries to import generic treatments for the AIDS virus, malaria and tuberculosis.
“We believe that when the history of this pandemic is written, history will remember the move by the U.S. government as doing the right thing at the right time,” Africa CDC Director John Nkengasong said.
India's govt eases hospital oxygen shortage as demand jumps
Under order by the Supreme Court, India's government agreed on Thursday to provide more medical oxygen to hospitals in the capital, potentially easing a 2-week-old shortage that worsened the country's exploding coronavirus crisis.
Government officials also denied reports that they have been slow in distributing life-saving supplies donated from abroad.
The government raised the oxygen supply to 730 tons from 490 tons per day in New Delhi as ordered by the Supreme Court. The court intervened after 12 COVID-19 patients, including a senior doctor, died at New Delhi’s Batra Hospital when it ran out of medical oxygen for 80 minutes last week.
On Wednesday night, 11 other COVID-19 patients died when pressure in an oxygen line dropped suddenly at a government medical college hospital in Chengalpet in southern India, possibly because of a faulty valve, The Times of India newspaper reported.
Hospital authorities said they repaired the oxygen line last week, but the consumption of oxygen had doubled since then, the newspaper said.
The number of new confirmed cases in India on Thursday breached 400,000 for the second time since the devastating surge began last month. The 412,262 new cases pushed the country's official tally to more than 21 million. The Health Ministry also reported 3,980 deaths in the past 24 hours, bringing the total to 230,168. Experts believe both figures are an undercount.
K. Vijay Raghvan, a principal scientific adviser to the government, called the explosion of cases “a very critical time for the country.”
Demand for hospital oxygen has increased sevenfold since last month, a government official said, as India struggles to set up large oxygen plants and transport oxygen to where it is needed. India on Tuesday stated ferrying oxygen tankers from Bahrain and Kuwait in the Persian Gulf, officials said.
Most hospitals in India don't have their own plants that generate oxygen for patients, As a result, hospitals typically rely on liquid oxygen, which can be stored in cylinders and transported in tank trucks. But amid the virus surge, supplies in hard-hit places such as New Delhi have run critically short.
Dr. Himaal Dev, chief of the critical care unit at Apollo Hospital in the southern city of Bengaluru, said COVID-19 patients in ICU wards require at least 10-15 liters of oxygen per minute because of their reduced lung function.
Health Minister Harsh Vardhan said India has enough oxygen but is facing capacity constraints in moving it. Most oxygen is produced in the eastern parts of India while the demand has risen in northern and western parts.
The outbreak has been spreading to neighboring countries which share porous borders with India.
In Nepal, thousands of people rushed to leave the country ahead of a halt to all international flights because of spiking COVID-19 cases.
Nepali citizens leaving to report back for jobs in foreign countries or to visit family members and a few foreign tourists lined up at Kathmandu’s airport before flights ceased at midnight Thursday. Domestic flights in Nepal have been halted since Monday.
Nepal’s main cities and towns have been in lockdown since last month as the number of coronavirus cases and deaths continues to surge. Nepal recorded its highest daily infections with 8,659 on Wednesday and 58 deaths, also a record.
In India, Prime Minister Narendra Modi reviewed the coronavirus situation with top officials on Thursday and told them to ramp up the vaccination drive.
The country, with nearly 1.4 billion people, has so far administered 162 million doses but is facing vaccine shortages.
The United States, Britain, Germany and several other nations are rushing therapeutics, rapid virus tests and oxygen, along with materials needed to boost domestic production of vaccines to ease pressure on the country's fragile health infrastructure.
India’s vaccine production is expected to get a boost with the United States supporting a waiver of intellectual property protections for COVID-19 vaccines.
Vaccine components from the U.S. that have arrived in India will enable the manufacture of 20 million doses of the AstraZeneca vaccine, said Daniel B. Smith, the senior diplomat at the U.S. Embassy in New Delhi.
Last month, Adar Poonawalla, CEO of the Serum Institute of India, the world’s biggest vaccine maker, appealed to President Joe Biden to lift the embargo on U.S. export of raw materials, which he said was affecting its production of COVID-19 shots.
The government meanwhile described as "totally misleading” Indian media reports that it took seven days to come up with a procedure for distributing urgent medical supplies that started arriving from overseas on April 25.
It said in a statement that a mechanism for allocating supplies received by India has been put in place for effective distribution. The Indian Red Cross Society is involved in distributing the supplies from abroad, it said.
Mamata compensates kin of Bengal post-poll violence victims
A day after she was sworn in as the chief minister of West Bengal for the third time, Mamata Banerjee on Thursday announced a compensation of Rs two lakh each for the families of 16 people killed in post-poll violence in the eastern Indian state.
The firebrand woman politician also promised to give a government job to one family member each of all the five people killed in firing by federal security forces on agitated residents in Cooch Behar's Sitalkuchi area during polling last month.
"At least 16 persons -- mostly from the BJP and the Trinamool -- died in post-poll violence. We will pay a compensation of Rs two lakh to their family members. Our government will also provide jobs of home guard to one family member each of all the Sitalkuchi victims," Mamata said in Kolkata.
Also read: FM Momen greets Mamata; hopeful of resolving outstanding issues
UNB had earlier reported about the deaths in post-poll violence in West Bengal, which also prompted the Indian Home Ministry to seek a report from the state administration.
Appealing for calm, Mamata told her supporters on Tuesday not to indulge in any violence. "Bengal is a peace-loving place. During the elections, there has been some heat and dust and calm. The BJP did a lot of torture. But I appeal to all for calm."
Bucking anti-incumbency, Mamata scripted history on Sunday by single handedly pulling off an astounding victory in the assembly election. She not only staved off a massive challenge from India's ruling BJP but also decimated the Left Front.
Also read: Mamata Banerjee sworn in as Bengal CM
Though her party swept back to power with a resounding majority of 213 seats in the 292-member assembly, the 66-year-old lost her own seat in Nandigram to her former protege-turned-rival Suvendu Adhikari by a thin margin of around 2,000 votes.
West Bengal witnessed the most high-profile contest in India's recently held state elections. While Mamata harped on being Bengal’s daughter, the BJP asked people to vote for "change and socio-economic development" after 50 years of Communist and Trinamool Congress rule.
Ramadan in China: Faithful dwindle under limits on religion
Tursunjan Mamat, a practicing Muslim in western China’s Xinjiang region, said he’s fasting for Ramadan but his daughters, ages 8 and 10, are not. Religious activity including fasting is not permitted for minors, he explained.
The 32-year-old ethnic Uyghur wasn’t complaining, at least not to a group of foreign journalists brought to his home outside the city of Aksu by government officials, who listened in on his responses. It seemed he was giving a matter-of-fact description of how religion is practiced under rules set by China’s Communist Party.
“My children know who our holy creator is, but I don’t give them detailed religious knowledge,” he said, speaking through a translator. “After they reach 18, they can receive religious education according to their own will.”
Also Read: "Xinjiang genocide" allegations against China unjustified: scholars
Under the weight of official policies, the future of Islam appears precarious in Xinjiang, a rugged realm of craggy snow-capped mountains and barren deserts bordering Central Asia. Outside observers say scores of mosques have been demolished, a charge Beijing denies, and locals say the number of worshippers is sinking.
A decade ago, 4,000 to 5,000 people attended Friday prayers at the Id Kah Mosque in the historic Silk Road city of Kashgar. Now only 800 to 900 do, said the mosque’s imam, Mamat Juma. He attributed the drop to a natural shift in values, not government policy, saying the younger generation wants to spend more time working than praying.
The Chinese government organized a five-day visit to Xinjiang in April for about a dozen foreign correspondents, part of an intense propaganda campaign to counter allegations of abuse. Officials repeatedly urged journalists to recount what they saw, not what China calls the lies of critical Western politicians and media.
Beijing says it protects freedom of religion, and citizens can practice their faith so long as they adhere to laws and regulations. In practice, any religious activity must be done in line with restrictions evident at almost every stop in Xinjiang — from a primary school where the headmaster said fasting wasn’t observed because of the “separation of religion and education,” to a cotton yarn factory where workers are banned from praying on site, even in their dormitory rooms.
“Within the factory grounds, it’s prohibited. But they can go home, or they can go to the mosque to pray,” said Li Qiang, the general manager of Aksu Huafu Textiles Co. “Dormitories are for the workers to rest. We want them to rest well so that they can maintain their health.”
By law, Chinese are allowed to follow Islam, Buddhism, Taoism, Roman Catholicism or non-denominational Protestantism. In practice, there are limits. Workers are free to fast, the factory manager said, but they are required to take care of their bodies. If children fast, it’s not good for their growth, said the Id Kah mosque’s imam.
Researchers at the Australian Strategic Policy Institute, a think tank, said in a report last year that mosques have been torn down or damaged in what they called the deliberate erasure of Uyghur and Islamic culture. They identified 170 destroyed mosques through satellite imagery, about 30% of a sample they examined.
The Chinese government rejects ASPI research, which also has included reports on Beijing’s efforts to influence politics in Australia and other Western democracies, as lies promoted by “anti-China forces.”
The government denies destroying mosques and allegations of mass incarcerations and forced labor that have strained China’s relations with Western governments. They say they have spent heavily on upgrading mosques, outfitting them with fans, flush toilets, computers and air conditioners.
Xinjiang’s biggest ethnic minority is Uyghurs, a predominantly Muslim group who are 10 million of the region’s population of 25 million people. They have borne the brunt of a government crackdown that followed a series of riots, bombings, and knifings, although ethnic Kazakhs and others have been swept up as well.
The authorities obstruct independent reporting in the region, though such measures have recently eased somewhat. AP journalists visiting Xinjiang on their own in recent years have been followed by undercover officers, stopped, interrogated and forced to delete photos or videos.
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Id Kah Mosque, its pastel yellow facade overlooking a public square, is far from destroyed. Its imam toes the official line, and he spoke thankfully of the government largesse that has renovated the more than 500-year-old institution.
“There is no such thing as mosque demolition,” Juma said, other than some rundown mosques taken down for safety renovations. Kashgar has been largely spared mosque destruction, the Australian institute report said.
Juma added he was unaware of mosques being converted to other uses, although AP journalists saw one turned into a cafe and others padlocked shut during visits in 2018.
The tree-lined paths of the Id Kah Mosque’s grounds are tranquil, and it’s easy to miss the three surveillance cameras keeping watch over whoever comes in. The imam’s father and previous leader of the mosque was killed by extremists in 2014 for his pro-government stance.
About 50 people prayed before nightfall on a recent Monday evening, mostly elderly men. A Uyghur imam who fled China in 2012 called such scenes a staged show for visitors.
“They have a routine of making such a scene every time they need it,” said Ali Akbar Dumallah in a video interview from Turkey. “People know exactly what to do, how to lie, it’s not something new for them.”
Staged or not, it appears Islam is on the decline. The ban on religious education for minors means that the young aren’t gaining the knowledge they should, Dumallah said.
“The next generation will accept the Chinese mindset,” he said. “They’ll still be called Uyghurs, but their mindset and values will be gone.”
Officials say those who want to study Islam can do so after the age of 18 at a state-sponsored Islamic studies institute. At a newly-built campus on the outskirts of Urumqi, the capital of Xinjiang, hundreds train to become imams according to a government-authored curriculum, studying a textbook with sections like “Patriotism is a part of faith” and “be a Muslim who loves the motherland, abide by the national constitution, laws and regulations.”
“Continue the sinicization of Islam in our country,” the foreword reads. “Guide Islam to adapt to a socialist society.”
Though Islam lives on, the sinicization campaign has palpably reduced the role of religion in daily life.
Near Urumqi’s grand bazaar, several dozen elderly men trickled out of a mosque during an unannounced visit by an AP journalist. Prayers continue as usual, the imam said, though attendance has fallen considerably. A jumbo screen showing state media coverage of top Chinese leaders hung above the entrance.
Down the street, the exterior at the Great White Mosque had been shorn of the Muslim profession of faith. On a Wednesday evening at prayer time, the halls were nearly empty, and worshippers had to go through x-rays, metal detectors and face-scanning cameras to enter.
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Freedom of religion in China is defined as the freedom to believe — or not believe. It was a mantra repeated by many who spoke to the foreign journalists: It’s not just that people have the right to fast or pray, they also have the right not to fast or pray.
“I really worry that the number of believers will decrease, but that shouldn’t be a reason to force them to pray here,” Juma said.
His mosque, which flies a Chinese national flag above its entrance, has been refurbished, but fewer and fewer people come.
On the ground and afar, diaspora boosts India’s virus fight
India’s large diaspora — long a boon to India’s economy — is tapping its wealth, political clout and expertise to help its home country combat the catastrophic coronavirus surge that has left people to die outside overwhelmed hospitals.
Around the world, people of Indian descent are donating money, personally delivering desperately needed oxygen equipment and setting up telehealth consultations and information sessions in hopes of beating back the outbreak.
Two humanitarian groups in the U.S. led by people of Indian background raised more than $25 million in recent days to help the teetering health care system. Indian American doctors, hotel owners and other entrepreneurs, some responding to requests for help from Indian leaders, have pledged or donated millions more.
In Britain, volunteers at three Hindu temples raised more than 600,000 pounds ($830,000) last weekend by racking up 20,127 kilometers (12,506 miles) on stationary bikes, or roughly three times the distance from London to New Delhi. And in Canada, Sikhs have donated between $700 and $2,000 to each of dozens of people in need of costly oxygen cylinders.
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The magnitude of the response reflects the deep pockets of many people in the overseas Indian community, as well as their deep ties to India, which have fueled similar efforts to help the country in the past.
“I feel that this crisis has kind of sparked or triggered a fresh and new emotional affiliation to India,” said Nishant Pandey, CEO of the American India Foundation. The group launched a fundraising drive on April 24 that raked in roughly $20 million in a week, much of it from the Indian diaspora. The money will be used in part to expand hospital capacity and oxygen production in India.
India’s official count of coronavirus cases surpassed 20 million this week, and deaths officially topped 220,000, though the true numbers are believed to be much higher.
“Mother India is in dire need of the non-resident Indians to step up,” Hemant Patel, a hotel developer from Miami, said in an appeal for aid on WhatsApp. His efforts helped generate more than $300,000 in medical donations, he said.
Patel traveled to his hometown of Navsari in the state of Gujarat in March to visit his mother after getting vaccinated and is now serving as a liaison between local hospitals and Indians in the U.S.
He has also donated eight oxygen machines —- holding a religious ceremony to bless the first one — and paid to have a van outfitted with a stretcher and oxygen to serve COVID-19 patients.
“God has put me in the right place at the right time,” he said.
Some members of the overseas Indian community have appended harsh words to their support efforts, accusing the Indian government of botching the fight against the virus.
Others, especially medical professionals, wish they could go to India but face travel restrictions there and new ones in the U.S., Britain and Canada.
Sunil Tolani, CEO of a hotel and real estate company in California, said he donated $300,000 to help people in India during the surge and lobbied the Biden administration to step up its support. Other prominent Indian Americans have also pressed the White House for action.
“If India would have put their act together, they wouldn’t need this help in the first place,” Tolani said, accusing the government there of “total complacency and incompetence.”
The surge in infections since February has been blamed on more contagious variants of the virus as well as government decisions to allow huge crowds to gather for Hindu religious festivals and political rallies.
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A spokesman for the Indian government, Prakash Javadekar, said it is ramping up hospital capacity and supplies of oxygen and drugs but is facing a “once-in-a-century crisis.”
The U.S. last week began delivering treatments, rapid virus tests and oxygen along with materials needed for India to boost production of COVID-19 vaccines. Britain is also sending a substantial amount of aid.
More than 6 million people of Indian descent live in the two countries — part of a diaspora the Indian government estimates at over 32 million, including nearly 3.5 million in the United Arab Emirates and just under 3 million in Malaysia. Donations are pouring in from non-Indians and corporations as well.
Sikhs for Justice, an advocacy group that calls for an independent state for Sikhs in India, said the Indian government blocked its COVID-19 relief website, oxygenfund.org, that aimed to connect Indians who can’t afford surging prices for oxygen to Sikhs in the U.S., Canada and other countries willing to send them money.
The group turned to WhatsApp and by Monday had managed to provide assistance to nearly 150 people, said its general counsel, Gurpatwant Singh Pannun.
An email to the Indian Embassy in Washington went unanswered. The Indian government has classified Sikhs for Justice as a terrorist group and banned it, Anshuman Gaur, India’s deputy high commissioner to Canada, told The Canadian Press.
India is not shying away from soliciting help from its expatriates, continuing a long tradition of drawing on their money and patriotic fervor.
In 1998, Indian leaders urged non-resident Indians to invest in the country by buying government bonds after the U.S. and other nations imposed sanctions against India for conducting nuclear tests.
In 2001, disaster assistance from Indian Americans helped rebuild parts of Gujarat devastated by an earthquake that killed thousands. Prime Minister Narendra Modi in recent years has encouraged Indians overseas to contribute funds and expertise to his sanitation initiatives in India.
During the current crisis, Indian consulate officials reached out to the American Association of Physicians of Indian Origin, which responded by raising more than $2 million in about a week, President Sudhakar Jonnalagadda said.
The group, which represents more than 80,000 doctors in the U.S., has used the money to buy oxygen concentrators and plans to expand a telehealth network to allow patients in India to consult with physicians in the U.S.
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The virus’s rapid spread in India has left few people in the diaspora untouched by tragedy. Sajal Rohatgi, co-founder of Subziwalla.com, a U.S.-based South Asian grocery delivery service, said dozens of friends and family in India have contracted the virus and two have died.
He and the company’s other founder, Manav Thaker, arranged for a U.S. virologist to give a talk on Instagram about India’s COVID-19 crisis and how people there can try to stay safe — information they say is lacking there.
Their hope is that Indian Americans will convey the importance of masks, social distancing and vaccinations to their friends and family in India.
“We really just want to give the right, credible information,” Thaker said. “Then maybe we’ll get some relief.”
India hits another grim record as it scrambles oxygen supply
Infections in India hit another grim daily record on Thursday as demand for medical oxygen jumped seven-fold and the government denied reports that it was slow in distributing life-saving supplies from abroad.
The number of new confirmed cases breached 400,000 for the second time since the devastating surge began last month. The 412,262 cases pushed India’s tally to more than 21 million. The Health Ministry also reported 3,980 deaths in the last 24 hours, bringing the total to 230,168. Experts believe both figures are an undercount.
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Eleven COVID-19 patients died as the pressure in the oxygen line dropped suddenly in a government medical college hospital in Chengalpet town in southern India on Wednesday night, possibly because of a faulty valve, The Times of India newspaper reported.
Hospital authorities said they had repaired the pipeline last week, but the consumption of oxygen doubled since then, the daily said.
Demand for hospital oxygen has increased seven times since last month, a government official said, as India scrambles to set up large oxygen plants and transport cryogenic tankers, cylinders and liquid oxygen. India created a sea bridge on Tuesday to ferry oxygen tankers from Bahrain and Kuwait in the Persian Gulf, officials said.
Most hospitals in India aren’t equipped with independent plants that generate oxygen directly for patients, As a result, hospitals typically rely on liquid oxygen, which can be stored in cylinders and transported in cryogenic tankers. But amid the surge, supplies in hard-hit places like New Delhi are running critically short.
Health Minister Harsh Vardhan said India has enough liquid oxygen but it’s facing capacity constraint in moving it. Most oxygen is produced in the eastern parts of India while the demand has risen in northern and western parts.
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K. Vijay Raghvan, a principal scientific adviser to the government, said this phase of the pandemic was “a very critical time for the country.”
The United States, Britain, Germany and several other nations are rushing therapeutics, rapid virus tests and oxygen, along with materials needed to boost domestic production of COVID-19 vaccines to ease pressure on the fragile health infrastructure.
India’s vaccine production is expected to get a boost with the United States supporting a waiver of intellectual property protections for COVID-19 vaccines.
Vaccine components from the U.S. that had arrived in India will enable the manufacturing of 20 million doses of the AstraZeneca vaccine, said Daniel B. Smith, the most senior diplomat at the embassy in New Delhi.
Last month, Adar Poonawalla, chief executive officer of the Serum Institute of India, the world’s biggest vaccine maker, appealed to President Joe Biden to lift the embargo on U.S. export of raw materials, which, he said, was affecting its production of COVID-19 shots.
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The government meanwhile described as “totally misleading” Indian media reports that it took seven days for it to come up with a procedure for distributing urgent medical supplies that started arriving on April 25.
The statement sad that a streamlined and systematic mechanism for allocation of the supplies received by India has been put in place for effective distribution. The Indian Red Cross Society is involved in distributing supplies from abroad, it said.