Disclaimer: Government’s response to COVID-19 cannot be measured based on the number of public notifications or circulars issued alone. There is nuance in how they were implemented, the policy carried, exhaustiveness and clarity. States have been involved in IEC campaigns, sanitation drives, rigorous tracking & testing, ramping up health infrastructure, urgent welfare etc which may not reflect in notifications. Notifications only capture a small section of the government’s response but are a significant interface nonetheless given the pandemic affects all strata of society in different ways and requires public participation to fight it. The timing and volume of notifications can help understand the timeliness and evolving nature (precautionary/reactionary) of the government’s response to some extent.

While most state government notifications (pls see above) came out in March, a handful of states have been issuing notifications since the start of January/February. While most notification curves mirror the pandemic (however displaced in time, preceding or following), MP is the only outlier.

To conclude as little the better, but interesting nonetheless. The state governments, districts, frontline workers have been working incredibly hard in these unprecedented times.

Curious to see how the curves behave with time - hopefully flattening.