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Mahatma Gandhi, K.R. Narayanan and plague
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The city of Surat which was gripped by unprecedented upsurge of plague due to dirty and filthy living conditions is now a clean city. We had to have a plague to make the people and administration painfully aware that cleanliness is the prerequisite for prevention of disease.
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THE REPUBLIC Day speech of the President was widely commented upon recently and it was described in some sections of the media as a manifesto of social and economic issues, which need to be focused for strengthening our democracy so that terrorism could be fought and eliminated decisively. Now that plague has broken out in Himachal Pradesh and medical experts have confirmed the disease, it is instructive to peep into two of the President, K. R. Narayanan's speeches on the issue, which bring to public knowledge his profound ideas. His speeches on health issues also underline the basic questions such as sanitation and hygiene to counter the emergence of plague in our country.
The occurrence of plague in Himachal Pradesh in February 2002 is possibly the first incidence of plague anywhere in the world in the Twentyfirst century. Its confirmation came only after it caused havoc by taking lives of some people and spreading panic in neighbouring States including Delhi. The day, February 19, when it was finally established and ascertained beyond doubt that it was pneumonic plague Star News in its 9-30 p.m. news bulletin reported that plague was a medieval disease and the fact that it appeared in the Twentyfirst century shows the inadequacy of medical science in completely wiping out this disease. The media while focusing on the eradication of plague has highlighted medical aspects and rightly underlined tetracycline antibiotic, the patent medicine discovered by an Indian, Dr. Subba Rao, which provided the most effective antidote to this scourge and contributed to its near eradication from the world. But the media attention on drugs and medicines, which constitute the cure-based strategy, to deal with a disease is inadequate to understand the totality of this phenomenon and needs to be expanded for a comprehensive assessment of its emergence.
Other determinants
We have to go beyond medical factors and concentrate on other crucial determinants which eliminated such a deadly communicable and infectious disease from large parts of the world. The President in his convocation address to the All India Institute of Medical Sciences in 1987 dealt with a theme entitled `Health of Medicine' and quoted a Professor of Birmingham Medical School, Thomas McKeowen. Anchored on a broad spectrum approach the sum and substance of that quotation transcends medical and curative strategy and encompasses essential factors such as healthy living conditions and clean surroundings as fundamental for preventing disease. It read as follows: "The most important medical advance of the Nineteenth century was the discovery that infectious diseases were largely attributable to environmental conditions and could often be prevented by control of the influences which led to them; the most important advance in the Twentieth century is the recognition that the same is true of many non-communicable diseases." Mr. Narayanan then said, "This statement is particularly applicable to India and other developing countries. While pursuing science and technology to the farthest frontiers of knowledge, it is imperative that we pay primary attention to socio-economic development, to eradication of poverty and malnutrition, to environmental protection, clean water supply, sanitation and education... "
A few decades before Thomas McKeowen authored the above quotation to bring home the point that the chief cause of decline of communicable diseases in Europe is the drastic change in environmental conditions, Mahatma Gandhi had written about the same issue in a forceful manner. Mr. Narayanan while inaugurating the 10th International Congress on Immunology in 1998 had used the Mahatma Gandhi's quotation which said, "... a meticulous sense of cleanliness, not only personal, but also in regard to one's surroundings is the alpha and omega of corporate life. Where the rules of personal, domestic and public sanitation are strictly observed and due care is taken in the matter of diet and exercise there should be no occasion for illness or disease."
In fact, Mahatma Gandhi included this issue of sanitation in his constructive programme, which he formulated and made it the central strategy for attaining independence for the country. His famous observation, "If we do not keep our backyards clean our swaraj will have a foul stench" remains so intensely and poignantly relevant at a time when, in fact, the reappearance of plague has put at stake our swaraj which was supposed to create enabling conditions for a healthy and wholesome life for our people.
Unclean habits
Mahatma Gandhi used mass media to make people aware of the prevailing insanitary conditions which gave rise to plague in our society. Mr. Narayanan in his brilliant address in the year 2000 on the theme "Role of media in preparing people to cope up with disasters" outlined this thinking of the Mahatma. He said, "In our history there are lessons available about the use of mass media for awakening the consciousness of the people to fight against outbreak of plague. For instance, Mahatma Gandhi wrote extensively in the Indian Opinion, The Harijan, The Amrit Bazaar Patrika and several other newspapers about the method to prevent plague. It is instructive to learn that Mahatma Gandhi in his articles, essays and letters, blamed our unclean habits and unhygienic conditions for the emergence of plague. He even appealed to the educated Indians to become missionaries in hygiene and sanitation. Once when plague broke out in Johannesburg in 1905, he asked, `What is the duty of the press on such occasions?' He wrote that the duty of the press was to notify the incidence of plague as soon as it occurred for information of the public so that they remain prepared to meet the hazard. After that he suggested that the press would highlight people's faults which caused the disease. It is a fine example of the strategic use of the media for alerting the public to avert the problem and at the same time critically examine the actions of people for its management."
President Narayanan then said, "I recall that when India was hit by plague in the 1990s many newspapers reproduced the writings of Mahatma Gandhi on the issue and widely circulated them for the benefit of the public. It is because of the focus of the media on cleanliness, health care and hygiene that many citizens of our country were motivated and cleaned garbage from places close to their residences and put there a picture of God or Goddess to prevent others from throwing garbage in the same places. This is how the media acted as a vehicle of preventive health care during that calamity."
Regrettably this time when we are confronted by the spectre of plague in Himachal Pradesh, the media has not sufficiently focused attention on sanitation and hygiene. The city of Surat which was gripped by unprecedented upsurge of plague due to dirty and filthy living conditions is now a clean city. We had to have a plague to make the people and administration painfully aware that cleanliness is the prerequisite for prevention of disease. One only hopes that plague in Himachal will once and for all make the whole Indian society realise this idea in practice and in full measure. President Narayanan's address to the nation on the eve of Republic Day which contained important references to social and economic issues has generated a debate in our country and brought about a positive churning in our society. Let the nation now refer to his speeches on health and the role of media in preparing people to cope with the disease of plague. Recently a senior writer of the National Geographic Society, after reading some of his speeches, had said, "I doubt if any of the American Presidents ever has made any such speech as Narayanan has done during the last four and a half years."
SHRIKANT RATH
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