By Arvind Rao 
New Delhi, September 2: Punjab is drowning. Not just a few villages cut off or a swollen river breaching its banks the whole state feels like it’s under siege. Roads are gone. Schools are shut. Families are huddled on rooftops waiting for boats. Three lakh acres of farmland, Punjab’s pride and India’s lifeline, are gone under water.
And yet, outside Punjab, it barely registers.
The death toll has touched 30, but the real story isn’t in the numbers. It’s in the fact that over a million people have been forced out of their homes. Entire stretches of farmland, the same fields that send wheat and rice to ration shops across the country, have been wiped out. Ludhiana’s Budha Nullah has turned into a monster. In Ropar, canals are breaking. Still, if you switch on your TV, you’d think the country’s biggest crisis is a political rally or some celebrity scandal.
A State Left To Shout Into The Void
Punjab’s Chief Minister, Bhagwant Mann, is begging for relief of ₹60,000 crore in pending funds and higher compensation for farmers. The demand is reasonable. ₹6,800 per acre is insulting when entire families have lost everything. Even Rajya Sabha MP Baba Balbir Singh Seechewal has written to the Prime Minister, asking for these floods to be declared a national calamity.
So far, silence. Delhi has made polite phone calls, sure. But where is the urgency? Where is the national acknowledgment that this is more than just another monsoon episode?
Media, Too Busy Elsewhere
The press cannot escape blame either. Yes, the floods have been covered by the Times of India, the Indian Express, and even by international wires. But look at the space they got. Inside pages. A passing scroll on a news ticker. It’s as if Punjab’s suffering doesn’t sell.
When Kerala flooded in 2018, it was front-page news every single day. When Mumbai floods, cameras stay live until the water drains. But Punjab? A few columns, and then we move on. It feels deliberate. And maybe it is.
Because Punjab is ruled by AAP, and AAP doesn’t sit comfortably in Delhi’s politics. Relief, sympathy, even media space everything becomes transactional. That’s the bitter truth staring at us.
It’s Citizens Who Are Filling The Gap
What keeps people alive right now are not government convoys but ordinary Punjabis. Volunteers steering boats into marooned villages. Gurudwaras are running community kitchens round the clock. Local celebrities are pooling money, with Diljit Dosanjh even adopting entire villages.
That’s the spirit of Punjab. But should an entire state really have to rely on charity, goodwill, and volunteerism while governments and national newsrooms look the other way?
Why This Should Worry Everyone
This is not just Punjab’s tragedy. Every acre of farmland that goes under is India’s problem. Punjab has fed this country for decades. If Punjab’s harvest is gutted, India’s food security takes a hit. Prices rise. Procurement falls. The damage spreads.
Infrastructure has collapsed too roads, irrigation, and schools. Once the water drains, rebuilding will take years. But if Delhi keeps pretending this is just Punjab’s headache, the cost will only multiply.
A National Calamity Waiting To Be Named
If this scale of destruction a million displaced, lakhs of acres gone, dozens of deaths, and more than a thousand villages under water doesn’t count as a national calamity, then what does? Why is the Centre hesitating? Politics? Pride? Both are unacceptable excuses when a state is drowning.
Recognition is not charity. It’s the bare minimum.
The Ugly Question
Punjab is not asking for pity. It is asking for fairness, for attention, for the same empathy and urgency India has shown to other states in crisis. And it isn’t getting it.
That leaves an ugly question behind: why are the government and mainstream media so comfortable ignoring Punjab?
Until someone answers honestly, every submerged acre and every displaced family is proof not just of a flood, but of a nation that turns selective when it comes to solidarity.
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Veteran columnist and social commentator offering sharp perspectives on politics, policy, and society.
- Arvind Raohttps://hindustanherald.in/author/arvind/
Ananya Sharma 
Rajiv Menon