Rivers rage, fields weep: Harbhajan urges Modi’s help for flood-hit Punjab

With relentless rain pounding Punjab on Sunday, 31 August, large parts of the state are under severe floods, described as the worst in nearly four decades. Cricketer-turned-politician and Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) Rajya Sabha MP Harbhajan Singh has written to Prime Minister Narendra Modi, flagging the “grave situation” and seeking urgent Central intervention.

“Many villages are severely affected, and countless farmers have suffered immense losses as standing crops lie destroyed. For India’s food bowl, this disaster has left people in distress, stripped of food security and livelihoods,” Singh wrote on X. He appealed for immediate deployment of the army and NDRF, emergency supplies, medical aid, and compensation for farmers.

State water resources minister Barinder Kumar Goyal, meanwhile, blamed the Union government and the Bhakra Beas Management Board (BBMB) for aggravating the disaster. He said timely water release from dams in June could have reduced the devastation. “Even as lakhs suffer, the prime minister has not issued a single statement on the crisis,” he alleged.

Goyal also accused neighbouring Haryana of double standards — sending letters of help while simultaneously cutting Punjab’s share of monsoon water flow from 7,900 to 6,250 cusecs to safeguard its own canals, leaving Punjab “to its fate.”

According to officials, torrential rains in Himachal Pradesh and Jammu & Kashmir, coupled with heavy inflows from local khuds and nullahs, have worsened flooding in the Sutlej, Beas and Ravi rivers. The state now faces destruction on a scale greater than the catastrophic floods of 1988.

On Sunday, Kapurthala authorities issued an alert after the Beas river swelled to 2.35 lakh cusecs, urging residents of low-lying areas in Sultanpur Lodhi to move to safer places. Deputy commissioner Amit Kumar Panchal said evacuation drives are underway with Army and state disaster response teams leading rescue operations.

Villages in Sultanpur Lodhi and Bholath in Kapurthala, along with parts of Pathankot, Gurdaspur, Fazilka, Tarn Taran, Ferozepur, Hoshiarpur and Amritsar, remain among the worst-hit.

With agency inputs