It is March 29 and I have been at the computer for a while, struggling to think of an opening line to the piece I am writing on India's Great March, of migrant workers walking to their villages. They are on the TV, which I have muted. What should I write — that "the night is shattered, and the blue stars shiver in the distance."? And then the voice returns, sharper than before: Smoke, smoke, smoke.

Beginning a piece is always difficult. It has been particularly strenuous today, because I did not go through the ritual of smoking a cigarette with coffee before sitting down to write. I did that because I have been rationing cigarettes ever since the Prime Minister Narendra Modi gave us less than four hours to prepare for a 21-day lockdown.