00:00There is a lot of second guessing. You know, you should have seen it coming. We could have told you
00:04so etc. It's not unique to India. You don't stop elections in a place like India. Societies are
00:12defined by their ability to come together when you deal with a crisis of this magnitude. It's like a war.
00:30Look again, when it happened in other countries, including UK,
01:00when a pandemic hits a society very hard, there are questions, there are arguments,
01:08there is a lot of second guessing. You know, you should have seen it coming. We could have told you
01:12so etc. It's not unique to India. It's happened in other societies as well. I'm very conscious
01:22of our own debate. Obviously, it's something I hear and I'm involved with every day. People
01:28have spoken about elections. Now, obviously, we are a democratic country. You don't stop
01:35elections in a place like India. We are a democracy. We are a very argumentative society.
01:41Now, there will be this kind of point scoring. Somebody will say, well, you know,
01:48this crowd contributed to it. Somebody else will say, well, that crowd contributed to it.
01:52Somebody will say, well, some, you know, individual or leader A didn't wear a mask
01:56here. Somebody will say, well, leader B didn't wear a mask there. So, I would say when I go out,
02:02I mean, in my sense, in my view, I mean, I think we need to put a pause to it. We have a serious
02:10national crisis. The fact is, I mean, societies are defined by their ability to come together
02:21when you deal with a crisis of this magnitude. It's like a war. When it comes to the media,
02:27I mean, there would be media where editorial lines are very strong, where, you know,
02:35when I see comments, very frankly, I mean, I see a lot of analysis by, you know, by people
02:41who write fiction, by people who, you know, who are political commentators. Now, I'm not saying
02:49they shouldn't have a view. I mean, everybody has a right to a view in this country. But I would
02:55take very seriously the public health people, the people who would actually sit very objectively and
03:04diagnose and analyze why we are facing the problem we are. And the fact is that we are facing that
03:10problem because these two viruses, the variants, the 1.1.7 and the 1.6.1.7, they have really
03:20hit us very, very hard. And they are far more virulent than the, you know, the virus strain
03:27that we saw last year. My message to embassies, keep your eye on that ball. Don't get distracted
03:34by the, you know, the rest of the debate. That's not relevant to what your focus should be. Your
03:43focus should be right now a very serious situation at home, just like the government is focused on
03:50addressing the pandemic at home, single-mindedly. You also please do that. So, we will deal with the,
03:58you know, the arguments down the road.
