On March 28, four days after Prime Minister Narendra Modi announced a 21-day lockdown across the country to combat Covid-19, a photograph f...
On March 28, four days after Prime Minister Narendra Modi announced a 21-day lockdown across the country to combat Covid-19, a photograph from Chennai went nearly as viral as the pandemic that has the world in its grasp. The image showed Chennai policeman Rajesh Babu wearing a crown-like, crimson helmet shaped like the coronavirus that causes Covid-19. Created by artist B Gowtham, the helmet added considerable drama to Babu’s attempts to enforce the lockdown.
Gowtham has since become a minor celebrity, being inundated with requests for media interviews. “I feel bad that there was so much art that I created before which did not get any attention, and it took a global crisis like the coronavirus for people to pay attention to what I am doing,” Gowtham told Scroll.in.
Indian police inspector Rajesh Babu wearing a #coronavirus-themed helmet stands near a checkpoint during a government-imposed nationwide lockdown as a preventive measure against the COVID-19 coronavirus in Chennai on March 28, 2020.
— Press TV (@PressTV) March 28, 2020
Photos by AFP pic.twitter.com/LO8l8lnNW0
Rajesh Babu is posted at the Villivakkam V1 police station. Gowtham lives nearby. Seeing that people were stepping out onto the streets “for silly reasons” despite being asked to self-isolate, Gowtham initially created a coronavirus-themed banner with plywood at...
