It is a time when no one can afford to be casual anywhere in the world. Least of all the leaders of countries. The Indian prime minister, his officers have claimed, has taken unprecedented steps to protect his country and is the first leader to acknowledge that no country has the wherewithal to fight Covid-19 alone. He is therefore talking to the leaders of the countries comprising the South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation as well as the G-20 countries for international cooperation. Since Covid-19 recks neither leader nor subject, neither land nor peoples, the eagerness to be seen as the first boy in class may seem a little misplaced, and a bit too early. The effects of these first-class efforts are yet to be seen, although it must be everyone’s single-minded wish that India and all other countries manage to ‘flatten the curve’ of the spread quickly.

There is, however, no doubt that Mr Modi and his government know how to make hay even when the sky is distinctly overcast. Let people in quarantine and in isolation pass their hours instructively and keep their spirits up, they feel. And which great man’s words can give both instruction and inspiration but the prime minister’s? All government quarantine centres across the country will be given published copies of Mr Modi’s speeches. It is not clear whether all other reading matter — P.G. Wodehouse, say, or Mahatma Gandhi’s works — will be boxed away to make space for these speeches, but the plan seems to be to fill the hours and days of tense waiting with Mr Modi’s magic words. Mass hypnotism?

This novel idea — nowadays ‘novel’ sounds ominous — may not have worked if Mr Modi’s address to the nation on March 19 was all that was available. The prime minister told the people what to do, how to look after the old and the poor, how not to overburden hospitals, but was rather reticent about the steps the government is taking. The nation may have been thrilled to hear of the Covid-19 economic response task force, but it is clueless about its function. The Canadian prime minister, for example, cited figures and methods of support to be given to vulnerable segments of his people during the difficult period, while emphasizing that the people’s efforts would be matched, step for step, by his government. Mr Modi, convinced that the middle and lower middle classes and the poor will be affected, has asked the rich and those in business to look after their employees. He wishes to put the people’s solidarity and resolve on display on March 22 in a 14-hour ‘janata’ curfew, during which at five in the evening, everyone is to clap or bang utensils from windows and balconies for five minutes to thank all those working at the front lines of the crisis. Spectacular. The clapping is a Spanish import, but the rest is unique. And uniquely meaningless.