Twenty-four hours a day, seven days a week there is only one shloka constantly vibrating in my head: ‘Go Karuna, Karuna Go; Karuna Go, Go Karuna’. I’ve been playing an EDM remix of this mantra non-stop and at full volume on my 2,000-watt home theatre system. Needless to say, it is working brilliantly. The wall of sound I’ve erected around my house is so strong, so high and so thick that not a single Karuna Virus can break in.
I am aware that I’m just one among India’s 130 crore soldiers fighting a historic battle. The fact that the whole world is now looking at India as a shining example of how to beat back the Karuna Virus is a proud moment for the nation. Therefore, my dear fellow Indians, do accept my congratulations for doing a fantastic job of executing Phase I and Phase II of India’s unique strategy against Karuna Virus.
Shock of its life
In Phase I, by banging pots and pans at high decibels — a WHO-approved torture technique — we not only weakened the Karuna Virus by making it deaf, we also gave it the shock of its life. According to the health ministry website, as a result of the collective pandemonium produced by 130 crore patriots, 56 billion Karuna Viruses in India have so far tested positive for post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD). This is the reason COVID-19 has been spreading more slowly in India than in countries like Italy and Spain. Just put yourself in the virus’s shoes: would you feel like jumping into strangers’ mouths and swimming into their lungs if you were suffering from PTSD?
But it is Phase II that truly embodies the genius of India’s strategy against Karuna Virus. We all know how viruses think, how they organise their defences. They are always changing their genes, mutating this way and that way to arm themselves against potential new vaccines. But they were unprepared for the magnificent ambush that India unleashed on April 5.
Pincer movement
Devised by our beloved leader, it was a cunning pincer movement that caught the Karuna Virus unawares. First we confused the virus by suddenly turning off all the lights. The Karuna Virus, unable to see, was thenerifying in panic. Then came the second blow from the opposite direction: tiny bursts of pure, disinfected, organic light from candles. First plunged into darkness, then blinded by light, the virus was so disoriented it couldn’t tell its RNA from its elbow. While it was still reeling from this onslaught, thousands of Indians delivered the knockout punch: firecrackers and disco music.
As per data released by the Icy Yama, 9 billion Karuna Viruses went insane during the 9-minute blitzkrieg of April 5. More significantly for India, especially from a geo-political perspective, another 12 billion Karunas decided to leave India and go — to Pakistan. As the health ministry has pointed out, “Our strategy is, instead of virus chasing us, we chase the virus”.
It is also why this whole obsession with PPEs, testing kits, etc. is misplaced — these are all reactive and defensive measures. They entail responding to the terms set by the virus — playing on its turf, as it were. Thankfully, unlike other countries, India did not fall into this trap.
Rather, India’s strategy has been to go on the offensive. To make the virus react to our moves. So, instead of taking action in the realm of public health, we are attacking the virus where it least expects to be attacked – in the spiritual and cosmic realm. The Karuna Virus has no defence against the vibrations produced by the ‘Go Karuna Go’ mantra or the photons released by the agni in every diya or the collective willpower of 130 crore Indians.
Having pushed the Karuna Virus on the defensive, we now have to deliver one last blow to neutralise the threat once and for all. Yes, I’m talking about Phase III of the battle against the virus. It’s simple: you donate your next 10 months’ salary to PM CARE, a fund set up specifically to enable every Indian to demonstrate how much they care for the PM. In case you are unemployed and therefore unable to donate salary, don’t panic. You can donate one finger a month for 10 months. This collective show of love and loyalty to the PM, modelled on the highly effective practices of the Yakuza — Japan, by the way, has done a terrific job of containing the virus — will inflict lasting psychological damage on the Karuna Virus, incapacitating it permanently.
Being the world’s sole spiritual superpower, this is India’s special gift to humanity: a psycho-spiritual vaccine against Karuna Virus. While the conventional vaccine contains physically weakened specimens of the virus being targeted, India’s innovation is to create psychologically and spiritually weakened specimens of the organism.
Simply put, this is the beginning of the end for Karuna Virus worldwide. From ‘Karuna Go’, it’s now Karuna-0, India-1.
G. Sampath is Social Affairs Editor, The Hindu
