The hope I usually have for India and her future continues to ebb with every passing day of this pandemic. This isn’t just because we appear to have failed at every step, because we have clowns masquerading as leaders, or criminals representing us in Parliament. It isn’t about the abysmal state of our healthcare system either, or the lack of transparency that allows millions of funds to vanish. It has more to do with how people among us—friends, neighbours, classmates, colleagues—have enabled this by allowing their bigotry to eat away at the once beautiful idea of India.

There have been signs of this decline all around us for as long as I can remember, of course, but it is our continued refusal to acknowledge this that has brought us to the edge of this precipice. Economists will spend the next few years giving us reasons for why a country once referred to as an emerging powerhouse has been reduced to the kind of place where hospitals have to beg for oxygen on Twitter. They will ignore the rot that has set deep into millions of Indian hearts and look for market indicators instead.