The PM warned in March that the pandemic could set India back decades. But the world's biggest lockdown has failed to stop the spread, leaving worst-case economic scenarios to play out.
New Delhi | Narendra Modi has cultivated a reputation for making dramatic decisions to respond to India’s complex policy challenges. Addressing the nation on prime-time television about the coronavirus on March 24, the Prime Minister was true to form.
India then had just about 550 confirmed infections, and many Indians believed their repeated exposure to a wide range of germs would enable their immune systems to ward off the virus. But Modi warned the coronavirus had “rendered even the most developed countries of the world helpless”. India’s recent socioeconomic progress, he warned, would be set back decades unless it could “break the chain of infection”.
