Writing a digital history of India’s second Covid wave
What will the history books say when they look back on this dark time? Surely, amidst the darkness, they will note that this was also a time when two of Narendra Modi’s signature campaigns came together quite nicely. Digital India and Atmanirbhar Bharat — self-reliant India — joined hands to form the national response as Covid made its ferocious return. Surely, history will speak of hashtags replacing hospitals, “Indian matchmaking” switching from matches for brides and grooms to matches for plasma and empty ICU beds and India turning to self-reliance when confronted by the reality of one doctor per 1,456 people and one internet connection for every two people.
While I have my eye on how history will record these times, I am not blind to the fact that history is itself an endangered discipline and will be revised in the re-telling. Fortunately, Digital India leaves electronic traces of today’s anguish. Google, for example, will tell those future generations that in late March, cricket reigned supreme across India — as it should. It sat atop all Google searches. Come mid-April, oxygen was king. Top searches included: “oxygen cylinder on rent” and “how to make oxygen at home”. Astute students of history will, no doubt, recall that Mahatma Gandhi spun his own dhoti in the 1930s. Bapu’s descendants made their own oxygen in 2021. Indeed, they will note that India came a long way.
These electronic traces yield insights into the state of India itself and how it might change as it emerges from the crisis. Let me name just three.