Flood Fury Exposes Systemic Bankruptcy Yet Again
Inderjit Singh
MILLIONS of people in Punjab, Himachal Pradesh, Haryana, Uttarakhand, Jammu and Kashmir, Delhi, and other regions are suffering unthinkable agony due to unprecedented floods – despite weather forecasts of very heavy monsoon rains issued months in advance. Nothing worthwhile was done by those responsible for the crucial duty of protecting people’s lives and livelihoods.
Shockingly, Himachal Pradesh is facing worst devastation even before it could recover from the cloudbursts and landslides that struck just last year. It is an irony that, instead of prioritising preventive measures to deal with such impending calamities, the government was busy forcibly displacing poor farmers and forest dwellers by cutting down their orchards and demolishing their homes. What the government was striving to impose has now happened on a much larger scale: hundreds of homes have been washed away across the Himalayan state, along with house sites and essential belongings.
In Punjab, over a thousand villages across more than a dozen districts have been cut off from the outside world by land routes. Caught unaware by the flash floods, many people have taken shelter on the rooftops of submerged houses or evacuated to safer locations. Over four lakh acres of standing crops, including nearly mature paddy, now lie inundated, causing incalculable losses. People have also suffered enormous damage from the death of cattle and other livestock.
In Haryana, nearly eight lakh acres of farmland with standing paddy, cotton, bajra (pearl millet), fodder, pulses, and vegetables have been destroyed due to heavy rains and the failure of the drainage system. The overflowing Ghaggar and Yamuna rivers, along with the Markanda and Tangri, have caused flooding in more than a dozen districts. Other districts continue to face waterlogging, particularly in the outskirts and peripheries of towns and villages – areas largely inhabited by landless labourers, migrant workers, and other marginalised communities.
A striking feature of this ongoing flood disaster is that all predictions and weather forecasts were available, yet no action was taken to prepare for the inevitable. This glaring failure of the system should haunt us all in the years to come. It is a paradox that the same modern technologies used so recklessly to exploit natural resources for corporate profit are nowhere to be seen when it comes to mitigating the sufferings of ordinary people – the ultimate victims of so-called “natural” calamities, which in reality are the direct fallout of a profit-driven model of development. Where are the governments and their vast machinery that claim to function as a welfare state? They are conspicuously absent when people need them the most.
These and many more urgent questions must be raised before policymakers and the political establishment pertaining to the prevailing model of development which prioritises corporate profits while inflicting immense suffering on the masses, stripping them of their inalienable rights over nature, and causing irreparable damage to the environment.
In the immediate and short term, governments must be pressurised to provide urgent relief measures – not only now, but more importantly in the aftermath of the receding floodwaters. In the long run, however, the corporate model cannot be allowed to play recklessly with the environment at the cost of humanity, wildlife, flora, fauna – in short, nature itself.
Amidst these dark times, there is a silver lining: the extraordinary solidarity shown by people from Haryana, Rajasthan, and unaffected regions of Punjab towards their brothers and sisters in distress. Massive amounts of relief material are being rushed to those in need. Media images of truckloads carrying food grains, drinking water, medicines, clothes, powdered milk, and other essentials reflect this human concern, standing in stark contrast to the insensitivity and indifference of the central government, which is duty-bound to prioritise the rescue of suffering millions. It is shameful that the prime minister, upon returning from abroad, chose to address voters in Bihar instead of offering even a few words of assurance to the people of Punjab and Himachal. If such conduct reflects his political considerations toward non-BJP-ruled states, it is all the more despicable. What, then, was the PM CARES Fund launched for, and made not liable for any audit? Where is the disaster relief budget? At the very least, an announcement of central assistance for all affected states should have been made.
It is also important to highlight heartening examples of how ordinary people have mobilised relief efforts for Punjab. Haryana farmers, despite their own massive crop losses due to inundation, have rallied to send vehicles loaded with aid. At times, their counterparts in Punjab have had to request them to pause for a while and not rush the material at one go.
One of the most remarkable examples, widely reported in the media, comes from the Mewat region of Haryana. Dominated by Meo Muslims, this area remains among the most backward due to decades of discrimination and neglect, particularly under the present BJP government. Even as their kharif crops and fields remain under water, the people of Mewat have dispatched more than 300 truckloads of relief material. In a moving gesture, 75-year-old Rahimi of Tilakpuri village removed her silver bangles and donated them for Punjab’s relief effort, along with handmade gudris (special bed covers for children). Volunteers told a local correspondent that they share a unique bond of kisaniyat (farmerhood) with Punjab – a living testimony to the historic farmers’ movement of 2020-21. A village elder in Bhiwani, whose home was submerged, expressed his grief to this author with a choked voice and tearful eyes: “I heard from my father that he saw Muslim men and women crying as they were forcibly evicted to Pakistan during the Maar-Kaat (1947 bloodshed). Now, we too are being forced to leave our homes in tears.”
Artists, singers, cultural workers, and NRIs from both Punjab and Haryana are contributing generously, while youth volunteers are physically engaging in reconstruction work. The Samyukta Kisan Morcha (SKM) has set up relief centres at multiple locations to coordinate aid. Beyond this, the resilience of Punjab and Punjabis shines through – a legacy rooted in a history of upheaval and sacrifice, where compassion and solidarity have endured even in times of despair and agony.
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A seven-member team of Haryana AIKS leaders visited the flood-affected areas of Punjab on September 9. The team included AIKS vice president Inderjit Singh, state president Master Balbir, general secretary Sumit, joint secretary Dinesh Siwach, along with Surjit Singh, Gurcharan Singh, and Nahar Singh. They were accompanied by Punjab AIKS comrades Lakwinder Singh and Narender Singh. The team took stock of the miseries faced by the people in the flood-hit regions and inquired about their most urgent needs, both immediate and in the aftermath of the receding waters.
