Saraikistan (the whole Saraiki Waseb) endured devastation without receiving even a fraction of the media coverage that a single housing society in Lahore commanded in Punjab-centric headlines. It is unfair. Saraikistan is the solution.
Media Blindness
Even though a Lahore housing society—built on the Ravi riverbed against the Lahore High Court’s ruling, later overturned through the Supreme Court by the PTI government under Imran Khan—also suffered in the floods and deserves sympathy, it is troubling that Punjab-centric media lavished attention on this single enclave while the vast devastation across Saraikistan passed in near-silence.
This is not the first time such selective vision has prevailed. In the catastrophic 2022 floods, when Balochistan’s villages were submerged, families displaced, and livestock swept away, much of the media chose instead to fixate on the staged hospital drama of Shehbaz Gill (from Punjab). He was filmed at PIMS feigning frailty, only to walk unaided to court once bail was granted. The charade was exposed, yet no apology followed. The cameras lingered on farce while the cries of Balochistan went unheard.
The pattern is unmistakable: Punjab is projected as the axis of Pakistan, while other regions—Saraikistan, Balochistan, Sindh, Pukhtunkhwa, and beyond—are relegated to silence, their suffering treated as peripheral. Such a hierarchy of attention is not only unjust; it corrodes the very idea of shared nationhood.
Floods as Moral and Political Events
Floods in Pakistan are not merely natural disasters but failures of governance and planning. They are social, political, and moral events. When rivers overflow, they reveal the absence of foresight, the weakness of institutions, and the neglect of communities left to fend for themselves. To treat floods as accidents of fate is to betray both memory and imagination.
A new grammar of response is required—one that shifts from lamentation to transformation. What follows are not technocratic prescriptions but foundations for rethinking the relationship between governance, environment, and community.
Keep Waterways Alive
The first principle is deceptively simple: rivers must remain rivers. Encroachments upon riverbeds, unplanned construction over floodplains, and the clogging of natural water channels transform seasonal rains into catastrophe. Town planning should not merely be about building; it must also be about leaving space unbuilt. Absence, too, is an architecture. Cities must breathe through their waterways, or else they drown in their own hubris.
Harness AI and Technology for Prediction and Response
Artificial intelligence should not remain the preserve of global corporations; it must enter the lives of farmers, villagers, and administrators. Predictive modeling, real-time satellite monitoring, and AI-driven alert systems can transform chaos into coordination. Technology must become a democratic tool—accessible in local languages, simplified for local bodies, and linked directly to community decision-making.
Decentralized Governance as Lifesaving Infrastructure
Local bodies are not an ornament of democracy; they are its foundation. A mayor in a small town, a village council empowered with resources, or a district-level planning board can act with immediacy no distant capital can match. Active local governments ensure that rescue boats arrive faster than speeches, and relief funds flow without dissolving into bureaucratic opacity.
Smaller Provinces, Fairer Futures
The creation of smaller administrative units is not merely about identity—it is about justice. Smaller provinces ensure proximity between rulers and the ruled, fairer allocation of funds, and accountability that cannot be hidden behind the vastness of geography. When governance is closer, relief is quicker; when responsibility is divided, it is also intensified.
Punjab’s dominance in media, governance, and resource allocation has created a structural blindness toward other regions. Smaller provinces offer not only administrative efficiency but also symbolic justice: they affirm that all lives matter equally, whether in Multan, Gwadar, or Tharparkar.
Why Saraikistan
Punjab alone commands 173 out of 336 seats in the National Assembly—more than half the House. This arithmetic grants it a structural monopoly: even if Balochistan, Sindh, and Khyber Pakhtunkhwa combined, they could not produce a prime minister without Punjab’s blessing. Such an imbalance reduces federalism to a formality, silences smaller provinces, and ensures that national policy is written through the lens of ONE province i.e., Punjab. It is unfair.
The creation of Saraikistan would begin to correct this equation, dispersing power, deepening representation, and reminding the federation that Pakistan is not Punjab alone.
Two Untrodden Paths Forward
Environmental Guardianship Councils – elected at the village and town level, tasked solely with protecting local ecosystems, enforcing building codes near waterways, and monitoring river health. Such councils would embody a moral as well as legal responsibility toward land and water.
Disaster Memory Archives – digital and physical repositories where each flood, each act of loss, and each lesson learned is preserved. Societies without memory repeat their tragedies; archives ensure that tomorrow’s engineers, planners, and citizens inherit wisdom rather than rubble.
Acknowledging What Has Been Done
The government’s efforts in mobilizing the military, setting up camps, and issuing early warnings deserve recognition. Yet appreciation must not breed complacency. True governance is not in the heroism of response but in the quiet discipline of prevention.
Reflection
Floods remind us that governance is not only about laws and funds; it is about philosophy. A civilization that learns to live with its rivers, respects the rhythm of its seasons, and empowers its smallest communities is one that has turned disaster into a teacher rather than an executioner.
To learn from floods is to learn that no province should drown in silence. Saraikistan is not just a demand; it is a philosophy of fairness, memory, and survival.
