E-Paper
Techilicious by Rajiv Makhni: Shouldn’t mobiles and laptops be tagged as essentials?
In a lockdown, nothing is more important than your device. So why isn’t it classified as essential?
The message from a friend was urgent. She wanted to know if there was anyone in this lockdown who could repair a laptop or sell a new one. The story behind the message was both funny and tragic. It was her parents’ anniversary; multiple people joined in to wish them on Zoom; in her enthusiasm to make it ‘special’ she popped open a bottle of Champagne – and because the laptop was right in front due to the Zoom call, the froth of the Champagne landed on the laptop. It was essentially fried within seconds. In a lockdown, with her laptop being her only lifeline for work and to connect to people, she was left with zero options.
That’s just one example of the way people have suffered in this extraordinary lockdown. With no sale of mobile phones, tablets or laptops and no repair shops open either, anybody who needs an upgrade or has a device on the blink has no options. The smartphone has become the only way to communicate. If that primary device dies, it’s curtains for all those things as there are no repair shops open at all and you can’t buy a new phone.
Welcome to dystopia
Life without a mobile phone is the true representative of a dystopian future. The sad part: millions of devices have failed in the lockdown period and people are left completely e-stranded.
It’s actually shocking that laptop and mobile sales and maintenance is not part of ‘essential services.’ For a government that has been pretty forward-thinking on the Coronavirus situation and has used technology extensively, this blind spot with sales and maintenance of tech is totally illogical. Services classified as essential are the ones whose interruption would endanger life, health or personal safety. Could mobile phones and laptops that are in the frontline to keep us safe and secure be better defined?
An entire nation working from home, about 500 million people using essential apps on their smartphones, millions of school and college students taking online classes, the government itself pushing and imploring all of us to use the Aarogya Setu app, online payments being made for food and groceries, the phone is the only lifeline to make a video call to a doctor for problems other than Covid 19. How is this not more critical than any of the others that have been classified as essential?
Upgrades downgraded
There are other considerations. We in India are still a feature phone market and none of the main parts of a lockdown life online can be achieved without a smartphone. Thus the many millions who were doing well with a feature phone in normal circumstances can’t upgrade to a smartphone as no one can sell them one. Then there’s this whole online classes situation. Multiple studies found that more than 40 per cent of households (even in many urban cities) were not equipped with the right devices to be able to absorb all the components of a study session (some phone screens are too small to see the online documents and others things teachers are sharing). Thus students are suffering through classes with inadequate equipment as they can’t upgrade.
The above also applies to people working from home for the first time. Six to eight hours of continuous online work paired with sketchy equipment makes for a terrible WFH warrior. No options though. There isn’t a way to buy the right device.
For all those that seem to think that opening up sales and maintenance for mobiles and laptops could be dangerous and risky, here’s my take. This is not true. In fact it’s the safest by default. The manufacture of electronics means naturally sanitised conditions, adequate distance is automatically maintained and hygiene is a priority when sensitive components are at play. The same goes for repair stores also as they too have to maintain high standards. And delivery of mobile and laptops would be through e-commerce (another category that should be fully open and not just for essential goods – but that’s a rant for another column), thus mostly contactless and safe.
The Covid 19 situation is dynamic and fluid. This may not be the only lockdown; there may be more in the future. Let’s make sure that the most essential lifeline for survival – phones and laptops aren’t locked down too. After all, we should all be able to open a bottle of champagne for our parents’ anniversary without getting cut off from the world!
Rajiv Makhni is managing editor, Technology, NDTV, and the anchor of Gadget Guru, Cell Guru and Newsnet 3
Techilicious appears every fortnight
