India’s COVID–19 Gender Blind Spot

Apr 27, 2020 | Bansari Kamdar
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The second most populous country in the world, India, has been under a nationwide lockdown since March 24, 2020 – one it intends to continue till May 3, 2020. At the time of writing, there have been a total of 27,890 confirmed cases and 882 deaths from the pandemic in India. While most agree that the lockdown was necessary to contain the spread of the coronavirus, the problem remains in how it was implemented.

Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s eager and abrupt lockdown policy came with many blind spots – putting the country’s most vulnerable at a disproportionately greater risk than others. According to The Print, nearly 200 people, largely migrant workers, have died during the lockdown due exhaustion, hunger, denial of medical care, suicide, and even vigilante killings.

Women, who make up around half the nation’s population, also remained largely absent from the government’s COVID-19 policy, to the extent that the government had to be reminded that feminine hygiene products like sanitary napkins were essential items during the lockdown.