The Bible says- ‘If a man claims that he is living in the divine light, and hates his brother or sister, he is in fact in the dark… does not know where he is going, because the gloom has blinded him.’
This year started with hatred. We had not yet recovered from the havoc of Corona that Russia attacked Ukraine. For the past three decades, wars had remained a tale of bygone days. They have returned with all the horrors.
The time from the attack of Covid-19 till the end of the year 2022 has proved to be dusty of many achievements. After the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991, it seemed as if the whole world had turned into a village. The work done for the eradication of poverty in the next thirty years was more than three thousand years of humanity. In India alone, more than 400 million people were raised above the poverty line during this period. The market economy had meanwhile overcome natural distances. Let me give you an example. The cloth made in India is stitched in the markets of Bangladesh. Buttons or zips from China would have completed them and people of Europe and America would have worn them. The concerns of nationalities had become widespread these days.
Corona has forced this fast-running chariot to run in the opposite direction.
During this time, due to the disruption of the supply chain of the entire world, various kinds of crisis started hovering over the world markets. Somewhere there was a shortage of medicines, somewhere clothes were missing. This proved to be a fatal time for the concept of ‘Global Village’. Fearing the pandemic, not only countries, but also states, districts and even villages closed their borders. As a result, all the efforts to eradicate poverty got grounded. More people were forced to sit in the lap of poverty again than those who had risen above the poverty line. For the last few days, the doomsday in China and the increasing number of corona patients in all the countries including America have started heralding the return of the destruction caused by the epidemic. This year is leaving the next year with new threats of fear and starvation.
As a result, the already widening economic inequality has started touching new heights. The Russo-Ukraine war has proved to take this tragedy to the next level. These two countries account for a significant share of 30 percent of the world’s total wheat supply and about 60 percent of edible oils. Not only this, Russia exports fuel and energy to Europe. As Moscow pulled out, an already shaky Europe plunged into a deep recession. There was a change of government in Italy and two prime ministers lost their seats in Britain. Rishi Sunak took over as the Prime Minister there amid inflation breaking the record of four decades. A section of India is happy with his power. What will be the benefit of this to India, the answer will be given next year.
War and conflict have sown new seeds of hatred this year.