Reporters Without Orders Ep 172: Covid's impact in rural Maharashtra and Rajasthan

In this episode, host Akanksha Kumar is joined by Diksha Munjal, Tanishka Sodhi and Shivangi Saxena of Newslaundry.

Diksha and Tanishka talk about their report on sugarcane workers in Beed district of Maharashtra and how the pandemic has affected them. They talk about a woman who had to resume work just a day after her husband’s death to repay their debt, a rise in hysterectomies and the local government’s help through “guidance or margdarshan”. 

Akanksha and Shivangi talk about their ground reports from Dausa and Alwar in Rajasthan about  vaccine hesitancy, lack of health infrastructure, increase in child marriages, and the revival of "nata pratha" where a woman is married to a man from the same family after her husband’s death. 

Comparing the Rajasthan government's response to Covid to Uttar Pradesh's, Akanksha argues that the Ashok Gehlot government made smarter policy decisions which found appreciation in the mainstream media. The UP government’s centralised approach and local policy decisions, in contrast, attracted criticism.

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