Getting the economy back to shape, post-pandemic

When Unlock 1.0 began in May, we were hopeful of returning to normalcy within a couple of months. However, three months down the line, the situation continues to be dire as we head back to more of localised lockdowns and curfews. Most of our states are reporting an increasingly higher number of positive cases than before.

- Shri V.P.Nandakumar

Economists often use the term “ceteris paribus”, Latin for all other things held constant when positing their theories or making predictions based on their models. I am not an economist but as the CEO of a large NBFC, I take a keen interest in India’s economic performance, mainly to get a sense of where things are headed. After all, the wider performance of the economy has a crucial bearing on business performance. But these days, we are in the midst of an unprecedented situation where even near-term predictions are difficult to make because we have no clue about how the COVID-19 pandemic will play out.

When Unlock 1.0 began in May, we were hopeful of returning to normalcy within a couple of months. However, three months down the line, the situation continues to be dire as we head back to more of localised lockdowns and curfews. Most of our states are reporting an increasingly higher number of positive cases than before.

As we come to grips with the ground realities, the one good news is that India has ramped up its testing capacity and that nearly two crore people have been tested so far. In the meantime, work on developing a vaccine is going on at a frenetic pace. India is also in the race to develop a vaccine with trials of our Covid-19 vaccine, Covaxin, having started at 8 sites. Meanwhile, the medical profession is working tirelessly to develop a treatment protocol that would cure the disease and cut down on the fatality rates.