We should take astrology seriously. No, I don’t mean we should believe in it. I am talking about fighting it seriously instead of humouring it as a piece of harmless fun.

Richard Dawkins.

But Indians did not listen to Richard Dawkins and stuck to the age old habits of believing in the pseudoscience. Right now, most of the gullible Indians – which is the majority – are too busy visiting astrology websites to figure out when will this pandemic end and to know their post – Covid future. The non-digital part of India are still into mystic  parrot, crystal gazing and off-course, Palmistry. Google Trends shows that the search for the word ‘astrology’ has zoomed from mid-March onwards. Not just astrologers, tarot card readers too are in high demand. Live astrology or tarot card reading sessions on Facebook and Instagram have become commonplace, emerging as source for some of the most wacky theories and predictions about the worst flu the world has seen from the last century. While the scientific community across the globe is busy doing human trials of the vaccine, astrologers are asking clients to chant Gayatri Mantra and urging them to worship the sun every day.

Some astro blogs even claim that coronavirus was predicted in Narada Samhita some 10,000 years ago. One has even accused Saturn and Rahu for the crisis. If the Narada Samhita knew that coronavirus is going to attack the world, why didn’t the Modi government start screening the airports or ban international travel well in advance, considering that it believes in traditional knowledge and have the penchant of creating empirical evidence based on mythology ?

Not to be left behind, the numerologists claims that Covid-19 has an occult number 4 and the year 2020 adds up to 4, which also shows that there exists ‘perfect harmony’.

Instead of listening to rational and scientific advice, Indians are still betting on this pseudoscience. A virus won’t care if Jupiter is aligned with Mars or if Saturn is the ruling planet of the year. The arrival of a pandemic cannot be predicted, neither its exit.

Covid-19 is an uncertainty and that is what astrology cannot predict. It cannot fathom uncertainty. No amount of number prediction or tarot card reading is going to tell you when the virus will leave, or when the economy will pick up.

Superstition is to religion what astrology is to astronomy the mad daughter of a wise mother. These daughters have too long dominated the earth : Voltaire