Executives play key role in fight against Covid

Bengaluru In the past one year, 23-year-old Shilpa has barely missed a day of work

Bengaluru In the past one year, 23-year-old Shilpa has barely missed a day of work. Working in various shifts at Bangalore Electricity Supply Company Limited or BESCOM, she is among the over 100 people who are busy attending calls on the Covid-19 helpline from all corners of the city as well as districts to respond to queries ranging from availability of hospital beds to the treatment process.

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“Earlier, we took calls on electricity-related issues but then we started taking calls on Covid-19. It felt a little different but we got enough training and assistance. We have received all the support we needed and there is not much stress on us,” Shilpa says.

“In the last one year, there was a lot of fear and people cried when they couldn’t get beds. Now, the situation has changed,” she adds.

The call centre in the city receives nearly 1,000 calls per day and each representative attends to around 80-90 of them in their respective shifts, including checking on people to see if their needs were fulfilled.

The staff got their first breather from Covid-related calls sometime in January when the caseload was reduced and the personnel were reassigned back to their original roles, that is, attending to electricity-related queries.

“There is no stress per say because we are after all helping others with information when they need it the most,” 27-year-old Anil Kumar, an executive, says.

In return for their services, these executives were picked and dropped back to their homes in sanitized company cabs to minimize their exposure to the coronavirus which has reigned havoc in the IT capital and other parts of the state and country.

These faceless executives, like several others, have played a critical role in the fight against the pandemic, coordinating between hospitals, patients and their loved ones.

Police, civic workers, ambulance drivers, health workers among several other sections have been the workhorses of the entire operation in Bengaluru and other parts of the country, quietly carrying out their roles behind all the clamour, chaos and cameras, experts believe.

Several such workers have also paid with their lives, religiously carrying out their duties but getting minimum attention unlike frontline warriors like doctors, nurses among others.

The case rise has not been kind to the people or those fighting it. More so, in the second wave which began in the first week of March. Bengaluru, in particular, has seen a sharp surge in cases since the beginning of March which has more than doubled since April.

The city has reported over one lakh more infections in just the first 18 days of April as against 31,886 in March, 6,813 in February and 10,311 in January, according to data from the Bruhat Bengaluru Mahanagara Palike (BBMP, the city’s civic body).

In the wake of the spike, the call centers have witnessed increased traffic in recent days, people aware of the developments said.

Gopal, the person in charge of the call centre, said that though there are several people who may not require hospitalisation, contracting the infection causes panic among them. This is when the executives try to calm the caller, coordinate with in-house doctors and check if hospitalisation is required.

“This covid helpline was set up here because this is a time-tested system where we used to at times get 25,000 calls per day, mostly regarding electricity-related complaints,” Rajesh Gowda, the managing director of BESCOM, says.

The MD also said that they have added around 30 dedicated lines and more personnel due to the rising call traffic.

To ensure services for all, the centre has also opened its helpline on WhatsApp which is tended to by trained professionals, medical students and even the police personnel to coordinate all related issues.

Bengaluru has nearly run out of hospital beds, especially in the intensive care units (ICU) and those with ventilators. But the situation on the ground has little effect on those attending to calls who have remained as focused on the job at hand.

“It feels really good when they say thank you at the end of the call. That’s all we need to continue,” Shilpa says.