But why is it much worse ? Because of the pandemic, or because of the lockdowns ?
My response followed this interpretation, despite the wording of your questions - clearly I should have been more explicit: "How would the lockdowns have made the pandemic worse?"
The pandemic, however, directly threatens people's lives. There have been 33,815 confirmed covid deaths in India since the start of the year, and 3 million around the world since the beginning of the pandemic. I think it is unrealistic to suggest that there have been anything remotely like that number attributable to lockdown over those timeframes.
With lockdown everyone is restricted and old and young go to the supermarket and back. As such the elderly are exposed at a higher rate before any level of herd immunity is reached.