Mumbai: The first Coronavirus-positive case in India was reported in Kerala on 30th January 2020. The person had a travel history from Wuhan city. When corona positive cases kept on increasing, the Indian government decided to go for complete nationwide lockdown. It was a big risk to lockdown 1.35 billion people with an uncertain period. Moreover, it was a big challenge to deal with the situation with limited resources like medical staff, infrastructure and security personal to keep people lockdown and assure physical distance.
It was certainly going to harm the economic growth but nevertheless, India decided to enter in this economic warfare and did a trial of lockdown on 22nd March 2020, under the name of people’s curfew. From 24th March, India is under complete lockdown. Here one thing needs to be mentioned that the India government must have taken into confidence the leadership of mainstream political parties before entering into the war. It is not possible to keep 1.35 billion people lockdown without their cooperation. We have seen during the lockdown period, falls SMS and rumours brought thousands of people on the street. If any political party would have decided not to go for lockdown, it could have done it. But they must have informed.
The slowdown of economic growth during this period can be seen from a different perspective. It is like if you starve a person for a reasonable period, after serving food he eats more with speed. Here is the same case; the economy is starved for a certain period. It will grow fast after the lockdown is opened. The 20 lakh crore package is posted lockdown food for boosting the economy. But, the moot question, how India is going to benefit from this strategic economic war? India has already taken steps by providing Hydroxychloroquine (HCQ) drug to more than 50 countries.
The HCQ diplomacy really worked in favour of India and more countries are asking for HCQ. This has helped to create trust in India in the world with respect to India’s advancement in medicine. People in India may have a question that when the entire world was criticizing China over the Covid-19, then why many countries including India purchased PPEs and testing kits which most of the countries said of low quality and faulty. Probably, it might be strategic purchase and make propaganda of its low-quality PPEs and faulty testing kits, create distrust about Chinese product so that other countries shall not purchase anything from China in future too.
India has sent back all faulty testing kits without paying a single coin to the concerned company. Prime Minister Narendra Modi, in his address to the nation on 12th May 2020 said, “Not a single PPE kit was being made in India before the crisis. Very few N95 masks were produced. Now we are manufacturing two lakh PPEs and N95 masks every day.” This is a result of HCQ diplomacy in this war.
Another aspect of India’s strategic gain from the war is that many American, Korean and Japanese companies want to move from China and this is the right time to bring them in India. Japan government has already declared an economic package of $ 2.2 billion to help its manufacturers to shift production out of China. To attract the companies, those want to shift from China, India needs to bring certain changes in its domestic laws. The rules for simple, smooth and quick land acquisition should be made. In China land belongs to the State so whenever it requires it makes available to the manufacturers. But, in India land is private property, it belongs to the people and very difficult to acquire for State or any private company.
It takes years, sometime decades to acquire so manufactures are not willing to come to India. Reforms in labour laws, high tax system and single window license clearance should be the priority of the government. India is also facing a huge trade deficit with China since last more than a decade. According to the Ministry of Commerce, the trade deficit with China in the year 2018 was $ 57.4 billion. It was desperately needed to reduce the deficit but due to international trade rule and aggressive trade policy of China, the Indian government and traders were falling short.
This war is an opportunity to the traders, Prime Minister Narendra Modi in his address to the nation also mentioned to pay more attention to Swadeshi for self-reliance. Through the Vande Bharat Mission, the government started to bring back thousands of workers from Europe and the Gulf countries. We should tap this reverse brain drain of skilled workforce and scientific community to improve our quality of product and declining research.
India’s entry in this war seems close to what Samuel P. Huntington said the clash of civilization. Here it is a clash of economies where India is the side with western economies. Though their face-off between India-China security personals, we will win this economic warfare without firing a single bullet.
Dr Rohidas Mundhe is Assistant Professor in the Department of Civics and Politics, University of Mumbai. His area of interest is world affairs, Politics of China, South Asia and Refugee Study. He had been in China for a couple of times for academic engagement.
(The author can be contacted at mundejnu@gmail.com)
