‘Stop spitting’ campaign catches PM’s eye

By Pallavi Dubey | NT

Bengaluru: A few years ago, most people would have turned a blind eye to the uncouth passer-by who stops to spit on the road. It’s repulsive, yes, but not the hill most people wished to die on. The advent of Covid-19, however, has changed that. Today, in a survey that included some 750 respondents across the country, around ninety three percent said they would ask the person to stop because “spitting spreads Covid,” says Odette Katrak, co-founder of Beautiful Bharat, a citizen-led movement. Their survey was conducted in July 2020, in the middle of the first lockdown.

As India went into its first national lockdown in March 2020, Odette recollects standing in her kitchen, over the sink, furiously washing her hands. “It was the time when we were told to wash and sanitize our hands as regularly as we could,” she says. As she looked out of her kitchen window, she saw a man spit on the street below. That is when it hit her that while extra precautions were being taken to fight COVID-19, no one was addressing the problem of spitting.

Odette immediately reached out to her Beautiful Bengaluru WhatsApp group, where everyone agreed that spitting must also be addressed as a measure to curb the spread of COVID-19.