作者： bharat.cn

The coronavirus outbreak has not killed anyone in India so far, but it has been absolutely lethal to the poultry industry, with a false rumor leading one farmer to destroy his entire livelihood.
Dr. Suresh Bhatlekar, a poultry farmer from the town of Dahanu in the state of Maharashtra, is one of the many local poultry producers that have fallen victim to the coronavirus-linked panic, fueled by social media posts suggesting that the COVID-19 could be transmitted through white meat.

Though unfounded, the rumor has spread like wildfire on messaging platforms such as WhatsApp, prompting many to drop chicken and eggs from their daily diet, while sending poultry sales plummeting by up to 80 percent across India, the third-largest producer of eggs and fourth-largest of chickens in the world.

Efforts by the industry’s professionals, lawmakers and veterinarians to reassure the public have so far been in vain. Some farmers, struggling to pay their employees due to lack of demand, are opting for drastic measures.

“Due to the losses, my labourers have no work as I have stopped production,” Bhatlekar said, as cited by the Hindustan Times, explaining why he decided to destroy some ₹5.8 crore – approximately $782,000 – worth of eggs and day-old chicks.

The Indian government has taken pains to stop the ruse from spreading. State authorities said that they would be setting up so-called “chicken parties,” where people will be offered to help themselves to dishes with chicken meat.

“Poultry products and dishes made out of chicken will be served to people at discounted rates. Also, an awareness campaign about the virus vis-a-vis poultry industry will be carried out,” Maharashtra’s minister of animal husbandry Sunil Kedar told India Today TV in a recent interview.

Indonesian Muslims conducted a rally in front of the Indian Embassy here, Friday, as a mark of their solidarity for Indian Muslims and demanded that the Indian government end violence against Muslims in South Asia.

The demonstration was initiated by the Front Pembela Islam (FPI-Islam Defenders’ Front), GNPF Ulama, and the 212 Alumni Brotherhood (PA 212).

The protesters strongly condemned the recent violence against Muslims in India that resulted in the deaths of 42 people and caused injuries to some 350 others. The communal mob by Indian Hindus against Muslims was triggered by the passage of the discriminatory Citizenship Amendment Act in December 2019 by the Modi administration.

The Indonesian protesters brandished posters that read “Stop Genocide of Muslims in India”, “Save Muslims in India”, “Modi is Terrorist”, and “The Government, don’t remain silent. Cut relations with India”, among other things.

The rally’s coordinators demanded a meeting with a representative of the Indian Embassy to echo their protests.

The Jakarta Police tightly guarded the Indian embassy that was protected with barbed wire.

On March 2, members of Muslim organizations in Medan, North Sumatra Province, had held a rally in front of the Indian Consulate General to echo their solidarity towards Indian Muslims and condemn the bloody violence.

To bailout or not to bailout? Finance minister Nirmala Sitharaman on Friday sought to allay market fears after the RBI took over control of Yes Bank, saying a resolution will be found soon. “I have been personally monitoring the situation,” she said on Friday. The government-approved plan envisages an SBI-led consortium buying half of Yes Bank’s shares, though further plans on how exactly the bank could be brought back from the brink remains unclear.

But the bigger question in the minds of bureaucrats, policy makers and industry, especially in this age of economic slowdown, is whether other institutions in the banking as well as other troubled sectors can also expect a bailout from the government. And more importantly, is it the right routemap for the government to take?

Put this into perspective with moves within the government to put up a ‘bailout’ package being formulated for the AGR-hammered telecom sector. With the Supreme Court hardening its stand that operators have to shell out their dues and biggies like Vodafone-Idea saying they will have to shut down operations if they are forced to pay up the entire amount (Vodafone has paid Rs 3,500 crore only out of its estimated dues of Rs 53,000 crore), reports indicate a proposal for relief to telecom operators to ensure they don’t stop operations could come up for approval in the next cabinet meeting itself. The total AGR dues is about Rs 1.02 lakh crore, of which about Rs 25,701 crore has been paid up so far, with Vodafone-Idea, Airtel and Tata Teleservices being the worst affected.

Bailout is a silver bullet often asked for by both government and private players, but seldom granted in the manner they envisage. While government has shouldered the losses of public sector entities through bailouts over the years—the repeated largesse for Air India is a case in point—the buck stops short when it comes to private companies. Though a bailout was mulled over last year for beleaguered private airline Jet Airways, it did not materialise, despite it being just before the general elections. The airline’s closure eventually left 16,000 employees jobless and an aviation sector without enough capacity as was feared. The airline was forced to suspend operations in April last year.

Another case in point is the economic slowdown that had seen auto and real estate players pleading to the government for bailout. While the auto sector was left waiting in the wings, the real estate sector saw Rs 25,000 crore-worth bailout announcement in November. The new year eve announcement of Rs 1.02 lakh crore infrastructure fund may have been billed a ‘stimulus’, but is actually a case of a rose by any other name.