A staggering ten states covering 33 crore people are facing threat of drought with worst affected being the Marathwada region of Maharashtra which became after the spate of farmers suicide because of their inability to bear crop losses and a financial quandary made acute by water scarcity and an agrarian crisis. The drought conditions have forced Maharashtra government to go for some emergency measures like running water trains while a public outcry over water use led to IPL matches being shifted out on court orders. Politics has heated too over incidents such as use of water to settle dust at a helipad prepared for a VIP inspection in Karnataka. The gravity of the situation is much worse than what one can imagine. The Marathwada dams are left with just three per cent of water reserve and levels at 91 reservoirs are declining in Himachal Pradesh, Punjab, Rajasthan, Jharkhand, Odisha, Gujarat, Maharashtra, Uttar Pradesh, Madhya Pradesh, Andhra Pradesh, Karnataka, Kerala and Tamil Nadu. Though, it is normal for water bodies to deplete sharply in the pre-monsoon period, but any delay in the arrival of monsoon would further worsen the situation. The availability of water in these reservoirs will also give clue to the status of Rabi crop later this year. Already the effect of drought has started impacting prices of pulses which are rising in the market. Government is mulling to resort to import of the commodities to check the rising prices and to build up buffer stocks. The Union Consumer Affairs Ministry has asked the state governments to project their demands for pulses so that timely release from the buffer stocks can be ensured. Already country had faced two consecutive droughts which had affected domestic production adversely but government is trying to keep the price line under control. A good monsoon would decide the food grain buffer, vegetable prices, fruit production, food prices and farm GDP making it the life line of Indian economy and agriculture.
