Surviving India’s lockdown: Kenyan students speak out

Jaipur, India

India’s ‘normal’ life is about a smoggy atmosphere, crowded roads and pavements, rickshaws honking, hawkers here and there and splashes of vibrant colour.

Often, you would see free roaming cows on the roadside; a heritage of belief among many Indians in protecting the sanctity of life.

That was before Prime Minister Narendra Modi decreed a three-week lockdown to save the country from the novel coronavirus disease. By Monday this week, India had 4,778 cases of covid-19, the formal name of the novel coronavirus disease. Of these, 136 people had been confirmed dead from the disease. Not as many as neighbouring China where the virus began in Wuhan, infecting 81,708 and killing 3, 331of them by Monday this week.

But Prime Minister Modi, who has lately ridden a wave of popularity based on his recent public health policies for the poor, locked down the entire country last week. Town dwellers were restricted from leaving, villagers barred from visiting towns. In short, if you were in, you remain inside. If you were out, you won’t get in.

The exceptions included a few hours a day for replenishing groceries, medical emergencies and those providing essential services.  It was a new experience for the young, especially, born in a country considered the world’s largest democracy with about 1.3 billion people.

So, how did Kenyans in India feel about the first seven days?

Dennis Matara, 26, a final year Master of Computer Science student at Janardan Rai Nagar Rajasthan Vidyapeeth University says he has been staying in his room all day and night alone wondering whether he will actually graduate and achieve his dreams. He has been studying the course hoping to be Kenya’s latest expert in IT. Now he fears he may have little to smile about.

“Right now, all I am doing in a ‘repeat-mode’ is study, watch, eat and sleep. It is very exhausting.”

Naserian Mary Jacob, 21, a Bachelor of Computer Applications student at the same institution says she is safe and okay but the challenges at this time are just too immense.

“We are managing even though supplies are very scarce. As Africans we are limited to choices of food as most of us are not accustomed to Indian spices and all that,” she said.

“Chicken shops are all closed while vegetable prices and other foods are over the roof.

No one around here stops to remember that we are just students, far away from home trying to stay alive at such unprecedented times.”

Most of the police officers manning the road-blocks do not speak English and that adds to the challenge.  With restricted time for restocking, between 8 and 11 in the morning, and between 5 and 8 in the evening, sometimes the students spend time facing interrogation than shopping. Yet Indian authorities say they don’t want to take chances with coronavirus.

The students though argue that the Kenyan High Commission in New Delhi has not given sufficient attention to their plight during the virus clampdown.

India is also a key destination for Kenyans seeking treatment at an affordable cost. And the lockdown also trapped other Kenyans who were in India to seek medical treatment.

They flew in for specialised medical care. In Delhi, they often live near the Apollo Hospital. This group also told the Nation they have not been reached by the Kenyan High Commission.

Justine Angima, studying for a PhD in biotechnology at Guru Nanak University in Amritsar, Punjab, told the Nation that there is no official communication from the Kenya High Commission on coronavirus, as opposed to the Mission in China which routinely spoke of the situation of students trapped there.

“My family worries a lot and I speak to them on daily basis.

“My main problem is that our campus too is locked and I can’t access the laboratory for my research work,” Angima said.

The High Commissioner did not immediately respond to our inquiries. Officially though, there has been no plan by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs to evacuate any Kenyan in India yet.

The country is so vast it is often called a subcontinent. As of March 31, some 1,600 foreigners were still stuck in Goa, for example, on the western side of India.

They were caught up due to the ongoing 21-day nationwide coronavirus lockdown according to Chief Minister Pramod Sawant. The information did not include nationalities, but there could be Africans or even Kenyans there.

The Goa State government said it had put up nine camps where stranded foreigners and migrants are fed once a day.

In Ranchi, the capital of eastern Jharkhand state, 17 foreigners were arrested in Badi Masjid area under Hindpidi police station limits.  Among them were two Africans, eight people of Malaysian nationality, three Britons, two from West Indies and one each from the Netherlands and and Bangladesh.

In a similar raid, police detained eleven foreigners from China, Kazakhstan and Kyrgyzstan hiding in a mosque in Tamad police station area in Ranchi.

Those arrested were not screened, but authorities did say they would put them in compulsory quarantine, which was to end later this week.

The controversial treatment of foreigners has recently elicited a heated debate with foreigners thinking they have been profiled.

 With reported cases of landlords ejecting non-locals, however, the Indian government has strongly renounced any maltreatment, even though it insists restricted movements will have to be respected.