Without going into the debate on the necessity of further extension of the present countrywide shutdown, it is better to assess the benefits of the order. At the same time, most of the people's reluctance to comply with it places another issue in focus: Whether Bangladesh deserved the order's imposition despite being highly vulnerable to the Covid-19 onslaught.
Given the scenes of flouting the shutdown in reckless abandon, a lot of people may take a negative stance. To them, since people in the country are mostly unwilling to cooperate with the authorities in complying with the shutdown, the order has finally proved futile.
In the meantime, it is the poorer sections of society who pay the price. They have seen how their sources of income close down as days wear on. And in what merciless manner they are made to savour the pangs of hunger, and become bewildered as the vehicles distributing free foods turn elusive.
The authorities enforced shutdown with an impeccably noble intention. The only objective they had in mind while imposing the order was ensuring that people maintain the 'social distance'. The goal turned out to be quite illusory in the traditionally bustling areas in Dhaka and the other big cities. Compared to the other countries' stringent enforcement of 'lockdown', Bangladesh experienced a softer version. The authorities also imposed the order with a tinge of mellowness - 'shutdown'. It was due to the fact that the latter had built-in loopholes, like inadequate manpower and mild enforcement measures, people thought they could get away with their order-flouting. And they have been doing that since the very launch of the campaign.
With the pandemic-prevention order still in place, a countrywide scenario filled with a steadily rising incidence of people helplessly falling victim to the dreadful virus continues to unfold. The logic behind the very enforcement of the shutdown, extension or completely lifting it has long touched the border of futility. Except those educated and are aware of the long-term ravages which the Covid-19 can unleash, the average people seem to be not caring a fig about the scourge.
What can be termed a harsh reality is the middle class people have lately started feeling the pinch of the shutdown. Ironically, this class initially took the order aimed at ensuring social distancing as a great opportunity to pass a few days in a holiday mood. They were not required to attend offices or workplaces. After stocking enough food, related cooking ingredients, medicines, they shut themselves in their homes. Time flew languidly as they watched TV channel magazines, movies, and engaged in gossiping for hours over smart phone messengers etc.
Newspaper hawkers one day stopped paper deliveries. No problem. All the dailies these days have put up their e-papers or online versions on the internet. Speculating on the coming ferocity of the coronavirus-spread in the country or the uncontrollable spike in the pandemic deaths in the US and a few European countries helped them pass their time of 'confinement'.
In one sense, they strictly adhered to the enforcement of the shutdown order presently in place; while adopting a lackadaisical attitude towards people recklessly defying the social distancing. They remained detached all along from the ordeals that befell the ultra-poor in the capital and the other cities. However, what else they could do except ruing the siege of corona times under which the country gasped for breath! Yet the novel coronavirus has provided people in Bangladesh with a much longed-for relief from many tensions, even those related to Covid-19. But the relief is fast transforming itself into becoming a period of mental stress. The jovial mood has evaporated from the earlier fun-filled families. With households reeking of boredom, the children have become morose as if overnight.
