Cyclone Arnab made landfall a few hundred miles from some of India’s largest data-centre corridors, turning a familiar coastal emergency into a warning about the country’s digital future. The storm has once again tested India’s disaster machinery, but it has also highlighted a harder question — can the country protect not only people, but the power grids, transport links and digital infrastructure on which modern economic life depends?The cyclone is the latest in a series of climate-driven disasters to hit India and wider South Asia. Floods, heatwaves, droughts, landslides and storms have caused billions of dollars in damage in recent years and claimed thousands of lives. In 2024 alone, extreme weather struck India on 322 of 366 days, according to an analysis by the Centre for Science and Environment. The events killed 3,472 people, damaged or destroyed nearly 2,92,000 houses and affected more than four million hectares of cropland.AdvertisementThose figures point to a pattern: India is not facing occasional shocks separated by long periods of calm. It is facing repeated, overlapping crises, cyclones along the coasts, floods in river basins, heatwaves in cities and droughts in agricultural belts, often within the same year.Also Read | Bihar floods underline need for basin-wide cooperationA warming ocean changes the riskScientists have linked the changing character of cyclones to the rapid warming of the Indian Ocean. Warmer sea surfaces provide more energy for storms, increasing the potential for heavier rain, stronger winds and higher storm surge. The northern Indian Ocean in particular has warmed quickly, and researchers say this is altering rainfall patterns and intensifying cyclonic activity.For disaster managers, the most worrying change is speed. A storm that strengthens rapidly can leave authorities with less time to issue warnings, move people to shelters and position relief teams. That makes accurate forecasting and early evacuation even more important than in the past.AdvertisementIndia has made real progress here. During Cyclone Biparjoy in 2023, authorities evacuated more than 1,00,000 people in Gujarat before landfall. India and Pakistan together moved more than 1,80,000 people away from low-lying coastal areas, a response widely credited with keeping the death toll low despite the storm’s severity. The National Disaster Response Force deployed dozens of teams across Gujarat and neighbouring states, illustrating the scale of preparation now routine before major cyclones.That record deserves recognition. Early warnings, shelters, evacuation routes and coordinated response have saved thousands of lives. But preparedness of this kind addresses the first days of a disaster, not the years that follow.The cost does not end with the stormHomes must be rebuilt, roads repaired, power lines restored and fields replanted. Fishermen lose boats, small traders lose stock, farmers lose a season’s income and local governments are left with reconstruction bills.The 2024 data show how quickly these losses accumulate. The crop area affected by extreme weather rose from 2.21 million hectares in 2023 to 4.07 million hectares in 2024, an increase of 84 per cent. For rural households, a single flood or cyclone can wipe out savings built over several years. For businesses, disrupted transport and power supply can halt production and delay deliveries.The wider fiscal burden is also substantial. A Finance Commission study found that five extreme weather events alone caused economic losses exceeding Rs 99,000 crore, while India recorded about 400 extreme weather events between 1993 and 2022, resulting in 80,000 deaths and losses estimated at $180 billion. These numbers represent damaged assets, interrupted livelihoods and public money diverted from development priorities to recovery.Data centres enter the danger zoneArnab’s landfall near major data-centre development areas adds a new dimension to the debate. Data centres are often seen as symbols of India’s digital ambitions, but they are also critical infrastructure. They support banking and payments, telecom networks, hospitals, government services, cloud platforms and thousands of businesses.A cyclone does not need to directly strike a data centre to cause disruption. Damaged transmission lines can cut electricity supply. Flooded roads can delay repairs, fuel deliveries and engineers. Damaged fibre networks can interrupt connectivity. Cooling systems, which depend on reliable power, can come under strain during outages. One local failure becomes a wider service disruption.The risk is not theoretical. A 2025 assessment by climate-risk analytics firm XDI examined 228 data centres in India and found that more than 12 per cent could face high climate-related infrastructure risk by 2050. The study projected that climate-driven damage risk to the sector could rise by 111 per cent by 2100 under a high-emissions scenario. Maharashtra, home to the country’s largest concentration of data centres, is among the states facing heightened exposure.Build resilience before the next stormThe response cannot be limited to stronger embankments or faster evacuations, though both remain essential. Climate risk needs to be built into the way India plans and builds. That means stricter building standards in vulnerable zones, flood-resilient roads and substations, diversified power supply, protected communication networks and careful scrutiny of where critical facilities are located.For data centres, resilience should mean more than backup generators. Operators need to assess flood plains, cyclone exposure, grid reliability and supply-chain dependencies before construction. Governments, meanwhile, should treat digital infrastructure with the same seriousness as hospitals, schools and power plants when planning disaster response.you may likeThere is some reason for optimism. Research suggests that structural reinforcement and better design can sharply reduce long-term climate risk for data centres; XDI estimates such measures could cut the number of high-risk facilities globally by more than two-thirds by 2050. But adaptation requires investment before disaster strikes, not compensation afterwards.Cyclone Arnab will pass. The recovery will take longer. And unless India treats climate resilience as central economic planning rather than an emergency afterthought, the next storm may find the country better at saving lives — but still dangerously exposed to everything that comes afterwards.The writer is Professor, Public Policy at FLAME University. He is lead author of ongoing IPCC’s special report on Climate Change and Cities