Artist Statement:

All of us are living through a pandemic that is a topic of many conversations, and will be studied in history books, and it will DEFINITELY remain as a powerful memory in all of our lives, no matter how different each and every one of us are living through it. We are all dealing with difficult situations around us, but so are many others. This video was created to offer a lot of explanation on the causes, situations, and results of COVID 19 entering India, and show the world how no one is alone during this COVID 19 journey.

The first part of the video starts with the origin of the Coronavirus. The numbers of infected persons were taken from the World Health Organization website, as well as listening to Anthony Fauci (an American physician and the director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Disease) on CNN with the updates about this pandemic. These numbers were accompanied by a voice-over showing the effects of COVID 19 on the world. Research was taken only from well-known sources, as there are many unsubstantiated rumors and theories that some people are spreading about this pandemic. Usage or reference to such sources were avoided, so that the audience does not hear false information, only facts. The audience should know that this is a reliable video that can be trusted.

The video details how COVID 19 entered India, and the overall status of the virus in the country. Research was done by looking at several news articles about the overall situation in India. The way the research was applied was done by doing a voice-over throughout the video. A part of the research in this part was conducted by Alex Ward of Vox, a well-respected news explainer website. According to Ward, the terrible state of India’s preparedness towards COVID 19 comes from its poor quality and scarcity of testing, poor public health care, expensive private health care that is out of reach to most people, and a massive population which makes social distancing nearly impossible.

During this part of the video, there was a determination needed as to how to portray the state of India’s response. This involved priority and placement of certain topics, wording of certain sentences, and deciding when to include certain voice inflections in order to invoke more emotions. An example would be emphasizing on the word “impossible” when talking about social distancing being impossible in India. All these decisions were made to give more emotion to the piece, attract the audience into wanting to listen to the rest of the video, and make the audience connect to it in any way. The intention behind wanting those results from this part of the video is because it IS the intro to the situation in India, therefore, if the audience did not like and/or felt connected to this part, it is unlikely they would want to finish the video.

The next part of the video discusses how the government acted, as well as what the government failed to do. Research was done with news articles and videos discussing the effect of the pandemic on the poor in India. There was a point of debate as to whether to include both the good and bad things the government did. The eventual focus was on the government’s failures, and showcasing the bad side of the situation more, because this was the reality in India, with the intention of creating a connection between the viewer and the people of an inept government. This also was intended to drive empathy.

After talking about the government, it felt necessary to talk about how COVID 19 affected the economy of India, and the lives of daily earning and/or lower-class workers. The video that was shown gives the audience words directly from the mouths of people on the street in India. People who are part of the masses walking across the country, due to a government-mandated shutdown of the country. The video chosen includes no voiceover or explanation from an outside reporter. It is raw video and audio straight from the field and people involved. It is from BBC News, one of the most respected news agencies in the world. This raw video was one of best way to showcase the effect this shutdown had on common people, specifically the poorest of the poor, who are unable to stay in the cities they had migrated to, due to lack of food, funds, and shelter. India instituted a lockdown on March 25, for an initial period of three weeks. With the subsequent loss of jobs and income, many millions were put in the position of possibly starving in the cities they work in, or walking for a few days or a week in order to make it back to their hometowns in the villages, where they have a network of support from family and friends. But with the complete shutdown of public transportation, if they wished to make this journey, they had no choice but walk unfathomable distances. The usage of this video was to break boundaries between the audience and Indian citizens, by letting the audience hear some words directly from the people of India themselves, instead of hearing a voice over which could have acted as a boundary of some sort.

The last part of the video was about how this global issue could be resolved through empathy. It was tough to think about the struggles that other countries were going through. Researching and discovering about India, and how this pandemic has affected the people there, was very heartbreaking and created a desire to find ways to solve and connect through empathy. Many articles demonstrated this same idea. The article chosen had the most effective steps that others could follow and still be motivated within this crisis. An effective list of ideas gleaned from the articles was created, and shown to the audience, so that they would have a happy ending to the video, and be given a solution, instead of having it be more open ended. This hopeful list was also intended to ease the audiences’ hearts a bit, after hearing about such a heavy topic, by showing them that this can be solved. Overall, the audience should come away with coverage of how this pandemic has affected others, make them ambitious to always lend a helping hand, and use empathy while doing it.

Through learning about each other’s weaknesses and troubles, humanity becomes stronger, more knowledgeable, kinder, and gains a renewed faith in the fact that pain and problems never last forever, because we are going through this together, after all, we are humans and that’s the way humans grow and bloom.

Works Cited:

BBC News. “India Coronavirus: The Underpaid and Unprotected Women Leading the Covid-19 War.” BBC News, 17 Apr. 2020, www.bbc.com/news/amp/world-asia-india-52279025.

Choudhury, Saheli Roy. “India Put 1.3 Billion People in Lockdown. Now It Needs to Help Many of Them Survive.” CNBC, 25 Mar. 2020, www.cnbc.com/2020/03/25/coronavirus-india-lockdown-to-disproportionately-hurt-informal-sector.html.

“Coronavirus Pandemic Demands Our Kindness, Compassion and Empathy.” Usatoday, 24 Mar. 2020, eu.usatoday.com/story/opinion/2020/03/24/coronavirus-pandemic-demands-kindness-compassion-empathy-column/2898413001.

“COVID-19: Looming Crisis in Developing Countries Threatens to Devastate Economies and Ramp up Inequality.” UNDP, 30 Mar. 2020, www.undp.org/content/undp/en/home/presscenter/pressreleases/2020/COVID19_Crisis_in_developing_countries_threatens_devastate_economies.html.

Hanson, Rick. “How Compassion and Empathy Can Help You Through the COVID-19 Pandemic.” Thrive Global, 7 Apr. 2020, thriveglobal.com/stories/compassion-empathy-help-through-coronavirus-pandemic-mindfulness/.

“Locked down India Struggles as Workers Flee Cities.” BBC News, 28 Mar. 2020, www.bbc.com/news/av/world-asia-india-52065968/locked-down-india-struggles-as-workers-flee-cities-and-homeless-call-for-food.

Mitzen, Ed. “How Businesses Can Weather COVID-19: Start with Empathy to Employees.” Global Trade Magazine, 23 Mar. 2020, www.globaltrademag.com/how-businesses-can-weather-covid-19-start-with-empathy-to-employees.

Replication-Receiver. “Coronavirus Disease COVID-19 Pandemic.” UNDP, 15 Apr. 2020, www.undp.org/content/undp/en/home/coronavirus.html.

Verywell Mind. 2020. How To Practice Empathy During The COVID-19 Pandemic. [online] Available at: www.verywellmind.com/how-to-practice-empathy-during-the-covid-19-pandemic-4800924.

Ward, Alex. “India’s Coronavirus Lockdown and Looming Crisis, Explained.” Vox, 24 Mar. 2020, www.vox.com/2020/3/24/21190868/coronavirus-india-modi-lockdown-kashmir.