After a protracted battle between Central Board of Film Certification and the filmmakers that ultimately needed the Bombay High Court’s intervention, Udta Punjab made it to the theatres on Friday (and the World Wide Web on Wednesday). Given the subject matter of the film, the spotlight is fortuitous – while always at the periphery of public awareness, Punjab’s drug problem has not attracted enough attention so as to bring forth concrete policy changes. Hopefully, the release of Udta Punjab will change things for the better.

While the state government is doing its best to prove that the problem is not as bad as people imagine, the numbers reflect a different reality. According to a 2011 report by the Ministry of Youth Affairs and Sports, “40 per cent of Punjabi youth in the age group of 15 to 25 years have fallen prey to drugs”. The rampant use of heroin and opium is hollowing out a historically prosperous society and killing the potential of its youth. To solve the problem, it is critical to properly diagnose its root cause. Research blames unemployment and the agrarian crisis, but this conclusion is perhaps an instance of experts portraying the effects as causes. If anything, drug abuse leads to unemployment. Delineating the causal effects is important as an improper diagnosis can lead to incorrect solutions.

De-addiction, rehabilitation and public awareness are cited as solutions. But focusing solely on such demand-side interventions is akin to missing the forest for the trees. Global evidence suggests that supply begets demand when it comes to heroin and opium. More often than not, an increase in supply and production of opiates leads to an increase in demand and consumption.

Source: United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC) Report

As seen above, cultivation of poppy, the source of opium, in Afghanistan reached record levels in 2014. The systematic proliferation is due to the Taliban militia, which is trying to fund its war against the government. Ironically, it was the Taliban that had banned poppy cultivation in 2000, resulting in a sharp decrease in production in 2001. But the subsequent War on Terror led to a law and order breakdown and poppy has managed to rear its ugly head again. With the increase in supply of opium, local Afghans too have succumbed to its addiction. In 2015, Al-Jazeera reported that there were nearly three million drug addicts in Afghanistan, significantly up from 500,000 addicts in 2013.

The situation is worse in neighbouring Pakistan. According to a report by the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC), there are 4.25 million addicts in the country. In Iran, Afghanistan’s other large neighbour, the figure is over 2 million, many of whom are hooked to a heroin derivative called crack. The three countries have a couple of things in common. Opium is the major culprit. And the principal religion is Islam, which considers intoxicants (including drugs) as haraam (forbidden). That has not stopped both the supply and consumption of drugs from going up, in Afghanistan as well as its neighbourhood.

The opium trade has spread its tentacles to India through Pakistan, with Punjab as the principal gateway and Rajasthan also vulnerable. So, it would be a great folly to solely concentrate on demand-side measures by assuming unemployment to be the main reason for drug addiction in Punjab. It is imperative that both the Centre and the state take adequate measures to cut the supply coming from Pakistan. Unfortunately, there are well-entrenched vested interests, cutting across political lines, who are deeply opposed to this. Wrestler-turned-drug lord Jagdish Bhola accused Bikram Majithia, Punjab Revenue Minister and brother-in-law of Deputy CM Sukhbir Singh Badal, of being involved in the lucrative trade.

Instead of downplaying the drug menace and incarcerating addicts like it has been doing since coming back to power in 2012, the state government should crack down on the drug trade particularly on the supply side. It needs to realise that addicts are victims of a larger game of money and power. Not only is imprisoning addicts a superficial solution to a structural problem, it also kills the spirit of addicts who need proper care and treatment rather than imprisonment.