NamrataMaheshwari's Journal

Like Italy, South Korea and I'm sure many other countries, India too is harnessing surveillance technologies to track movements. One way to look at it may be that is a desperate, albeit not foolproof, attempt to contain the pandemic; and another way to look at it is that it is pure optics - the government gives the impression of timely governance through superficial monitoring. Either way, it is most certainly an invasion of privacy - unfettered and waiting to be misused.

Despite being fully aware of the potentially disastrous repercussions, I cannot help but question what else could possibly be done when the world is in the middle of an existential crisis and there isn't enough time to devise accountability frameworks before swinging available mechanisms into action. I know people who returned to India from high risk nations recently who were asked to self-isolate but flouted instructions and common sense. The government tracked their movements through their phones and was able to (at least to some extent) restrict movement. In some cases local officers personally visit the household to ensure quarantine measures are being adhered to. But that is not feasible in a country of over a billion.

While I do understand the risk of invasion of privacy, I wonder if at the moment, there are much bigger, life-threatening, risks and it may be pragmatic, utilitarian and even necessary, to not let the former risk overshadow the latter. What would the ideal scenario be in such a situation? In the absence of technology, governance in this regard would arguably be impaired if not rendered impossible; and if we wait to develop high accountability standards to ensure that surveillance tech is not misused, it may be too late. There probably is no perfect answer and no matter what we choose, we lose something of importance. But I was wondering what your thoughts are on how this should be handled in a way that would best save the present as well as the future.

Surely these are the right questions. Any form of answer depends, naturally, on the degree of trust one can place in the government, as well as on the legal structures which, as you say, will undoubtedly bend to some extent in the presence of life-or-death social exigency.

This is—in the US and the UK as well as in India—unfortunately a moment in which the leadership isn't trustworthy, and isn't trusted. The reasons for that are many, which are explored in the Times of India op-ed in which Mishi and I take up your subject.

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