Covid-19: The human factor

Barkha Dutt's book bears poignant witness to the stories of those who suffered during the two years of the pandemic

The nationwide lockdown imposed by the Government of India on March 24, 2020 might be a distant memory for those who have picked up the pieces of their lives and moved on. This is certainly not the case for numerous Indians whose wounds are so deep that a lot more time will have to pass before any semblance of closure or healing can find its way to them. One way to honour these people is to bear witness to their stories, their pain and their anger.

Journalist and author Barkha Dutt does this remarkably well in her new book To Hell and Back: Humans of COVID. It comes seven years after her first book This Unquiet Land: Stories from India’s Fault Lines (2015). The common thread across both is her felicity with storytelling that combines the personal and the political. She manages to move even those readers who may not see eye to eye with her on many crucial issues.

Dutt writes, “There are other, better books on the science of COVID, on the policies that should or should not have been enforced, on the inside track of what the prime minister was thinking. This is not that book.” Her objective is to chronicle victims, survivors and heroes from across the length and breadth of India — its cities, villages, and small towns. There is no attempt to whitewash the humongous tragedy by saying that everyone felt the impact equally.

There are stories here of migrant workers who were compelled to beg for food, of girls who were molested by their fathers during the lockdown, of widows who were abandoned by their sons, of communities that struggled to find clean drinking water, of doctors who were threatened by relatives of seriously ill patients, and of heartbroken children who failed to get oxygen for their dying parents.

Dutt writes, “Over two consecutive summers, as space shrank at the riverbanks and bodies stacked up like a macabre mountain of pending laundry, cremation grounds became battlefields.” Families had to fight for space to cremate dead bodies and bid final goodbyes to their loved ones, and haggle over the exorbitant prices of wood being used for the cremation.

The book also pays homage to “the Hindu gravedigger at a Muslim burial ground” and “a Muslim volunteer who performed the last rites for a six-month-old Hindu baby” in addition to “gurudwaras that ran oxygen langars” and “the women in a housing society in Surat who decided to cook five rotis more at every meal to feed migrant workers in their city.” These are important stories because acts of compassion and charity get lost amid the doomscrolling.

Dutt’s pandemic book grew out of her on-ground reporting for Mojo Story, the digital media platform that she started with a lean team of colleagues after her long career in television. As she confessed at the recently concluded Jaipur Literature Festival, the pandemic reminded her of why she became a journalist in the first place and pushed her to document one of the worst humanitarian crises and large-scale forced migrations in the history of independent India.

How did the fiery sense of purpose get dimmed? Why did it need a recharge? Can journalists thrive only in contexts of crises? An honest exploration of these questions would stand to benefit not only Dutt but every journalist who feels jaded in their profession. Writing a book might give them the time to sit back and witness their own transformation. If all television journalists engaged in such an exercise, our democracy might gain from it.

Dutt’s success as a writer of non-fiction lies in her ability to take readers on an emotional journey. Through her words, the faceless millions become people in flesh and blood who have to prostrate themselves before the state to access the services to which they are entitled. When the state fails to do its job, they find support in “a community of grief”. While it cannot make up for the lack of infrastructure, it reassures them that they are not alone in their distress.

Tragically, Dutt became part of the very story that she was reporting. Her father died from Covid-19. Despite all her privilege and connections, Dutt could not save him. As a daughter, it was devastating for her to hear the man who raised her say, “I am choking, treat me.” On the day that he was cremated, Dutt tested positive. The book is stronger thanks to her decision to share her own vulnerabilities. It would help readers appreciate the public service that many journalists offered during the pandemic.

At some level, this book is also about coming to terms with the fact that grief throws up many surprises. It challenges our beliefs about ourselves, and forces us to look at our choices with greater discernment. Dutt found it “incredibly painful and difficult” to write this book. She admits to having missed many deadlines, and even entertaining the thought of abandoning it. She even took a break from the news cycle to write the book in another country.

Did this help? Dutt writes, “I found that I would cry inconsolably and without provocation, sometimes for hours on end. It was some sort of mental and emotional breakdown, a release perhaps of all that I had observed — and all that I had lost. All that we had lost, collectively.”

The awareness that our lives are deeply intertwined is perhaps the biggest lesson to learn from an invisible virus that has shaken everyone, including the high and mighty among us.

To Hell and Back: Humans of COVID; Author: Barkha Dutt; Publisher: Juggernaut Books; Pages: 248; Price: Rs 699