ISAS Working Papers

This paper explores the phenomenon of drug abuse among the youth of Punjab, India. In aiming to identify the factors influencing the problem, the paper focuses on the importance of the exceptional aspects of drug abuse in Punjab, including the core demographic of users and the types of drugs being commonly used. These unique characteristics point towards the contextual factors that have possibly influenced the scale and character that the state’s drug problem has taken on. For example, the rural background of Punjab’s drug-user demographic hints at the influence of factors including historical developments in the state’s rural economy and the Punjabi culture of masculinity which is deeply tied to images of strength and physical labour. On the other hand, their relatively-affluent class background suggests that the impact of unemployment, the cultures of consumption and aspiration and the modernity associated with injectable drugs are all particularly powerful in driving them to use drugs. The literature referred to in this paper includes both quantitative and qualitative studies of drug abuse in Punjab and throughout India, the history of Punjab’s rural economy, unemployment, participation in higher education, masculinity, as well as ethnographies of young men in Punjab.