The Covid pandemic devastated the world in a profound manner. Each one of us can count our losses. For me it has been one uncle, one cousin, one beloved colleague, one good friend, one mentor of yesteryears and his spouse, five significant acquaintances—the list goes on. We are all familiar with the dreadful impact of Justinian’s Plague, the Black Death, the Spanish Flu, and similar occurrences in history. In the classic Kannada novel and movie, Samskara, we are shown how a plague that works through rural Mysuru in some indeterminate year, more than a century ago, destabilises individuals wrapped in...