Social Distancing in Practice

Gautam Kumar Das

Stopping by a post in the social media I like to go through the letter where an Inspector-in-Charge under Baruipur District Police requested the Chairman of a Municipality to install bamboo fencing and drop gate at the 36 points of the municipal areas under his control at the earliest as these mentioned places have been declared to be the most vulnerable area for Corona pandemic.

For maintenance of social distance, sometimes an entire area is required to be blocked or locked down. In the next post, my friend makes a fun of this bamboo fencing where he writes when a goli (a narrow lane) is locked with a horizontal bamboo pole and we continue our movement down our head below the bamboo pole and it is defined as lock down. From such lock down, we can envisage as fun or joke, a form of locked-up energy, where most of the people is locked up in long-term social distance. They were in moods of holidays at the first phase of lock down, but of late most of them are found in a state of deep depression because of effortless jobless and dreamless situations.

Social distancing is now in practice almost all the 193 countries across the globe. Customers outside the bank premises or shoppers outside the grocery keep a safe distance standing in the social circles. Worshipper inside the house of worship area are keeping faith followed by the social distance maintaining passengers in the international airports or the journalists keep social distances when waiting to hear the outcome of the meeting of the Health Committee inside the corridor of Nabanna, the state’s chief administrative building. Social distance, the desired degree of remoteness between a member of one social group and the members of another in terms of the level of intimacy, has been extended and expanded the most by the pandemic of Corona virus.
At present, recommending people at least one meter apart, social distancing is an effective protective measure against the Corona virus outbreak around the world. The social distance is now the physical distance which a person can stand to be away from another person. Practice of social distancing has gradually been accelerating exponentially by technological advancements like telephone, walkie talkie, television and the most for social media and internet of the modern era. But the social distancing, an almost unknown chapter of sociology, is now established globally due to pandemic of Corona virus.

Social distancing had been started with the introduction of caste and religion in the society in ancient times and mediaeval era. Veteran actors, musicians, singers, poets and novelists maintain social distance, though social distance should not be appropriate to the politicians because they are guarded for the security of their own. Governments led by those politicians put social distance into practice and the common people quickly built up a good practice. Being in practice, the people of the country put up sincerity and discipline and they do not ever fail to practice outside home.

Coping with such practice of social distancing the international body of WHO, philanthropically, in this present crisis, reminds us all of a simple truth - we are one humanity, we share the same planet, we share the same hopes and dreams, we share the same destiny. But a few people around the country still disregard common guidelines and rules of the social distancing, even during burning or burying of the deceased infected with Corona virus. Those who disregard the guidelines of the WHO, should embark on self-isolation immediately. People should not let the emotional burden of the loss erode their knowledge of what’s at stake. Man, a social animal, either to be habituated with such practice of social distancing and lock down for the sake of country in the present days crisis of the country through their instinct nature of social contract, or the reward is awaiting for them when police threaten to baton them open on the road as the most social mischief-makers have to be impervious to humiliation and shame.

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Apr 23, 2020