CUTTACK: People are doing their bit to spread awareness on COVID-19 prevention. In Athagarh’s Gada Sahi, an artist has turned the walls of almost of every building into his canvas for the purpose.Artist Durga Prasad Mohapatra picked up his brush and started painting walls of his locality to create awareness on dangers of coronavirus and precautionary measures to be taken to contain spread of the highly contagious infection.
The 38-year-old says he felt the urge to paint the walls with COVID messages after he saw people violating the norms imposed by Government. He took it up as a mission on March 25 soon after imposition of lockdown by the Government and has ever since painted nearly every wall in the locality. Giant image of COVID-19 virus and slogans with messages like maintain social distancing, wear mask, stay indoors, use soap and sanitisers in washing hand etc adorn the walls of individual houses, public places and police barricades of Athagarh and its adjacent villages like Radhagovindpur and Birakishorepur.
“I used to eke out a living by painting temples, religious structures, making clay idols and carving stone and wooden idols in nearby locality and train students on canvas painting as well as idol making in a workshop I set-up near my house”, said Mohapatra. “After I found lack of awareness among locals led to violation of lockdown guidelines promulgated under Odisha COVID-19 Regulation-2020 and social distancing norm which are needed to prevent spread of COVID-19, I suspended all the works in workshop and decided to go for convincing people to adhere to government guidelines with my art work,” said Mohapatra.
“Adhering to all guidelines laid by the Government on the virus, I paint walls from 6 am to 9 am and from 4 pm to 6 pm everyday,” said Mohapatra. “Though I don’t earn anything from this, it is a satisfying work as I see people following the norms more strictly now. I feel like one of the warriors who are fighting against the disease”, he says.