India Hit by Its Driest Monsoon in 11 Years

Ramesh Reddy, a 44-year-old farmer, staked everything he had on his 3.5-hectare tomato farm last June. The farmer from Kolar district in the southern state of Karnataka invested 320,000 rupees (about Rp 59.2 million), borrowing 250,000 rupees (about Rp 46.2 million) at an annual interest rate of 24% and putting his wife’s wedding jewellery up as collateral.

He had planned to use the harvest to repay the loan and clear overdue tuition fees for his son. But the irrigation well on his land suddenly dried up. Within three weeks, the tomato plants had turned yellow and wilted. The harvest failed completely.

“I have lost everything I invested,” he told DW. “There is no money left for the next planting season, and I don’t know how I will repay the loan.”

He is now exploring security guard work in the state capital, Bengaluru, and preparing to leave his farmland.

India’s driest monsoon in 11 years

For India, the monsoon is more than a four-month rainy season. It replenishes reservoirs, sustains agriculture and helps maintain water supplies and electricity generation across much of the country.

Nearly half of India’s workforce relies on agriculture for its livelihood, work that is demanding and economically vulnerable.

This year, India received 759.4 millimetres of rainfall between June and September, well below the long-term average of 868.6 millimetres. The 12.6% deficit made it the driest monsoon in 11 years and the fourth-driest of this century.

Climate scientist Madhavan Nair Rajeevan, a former secretary at India’s Ministry of Earth Sciences, said a severe El Niño was the main factor behind this year’s poor monsoon. He had previously warned that the climate phenomenon posed a serious risk to rainfall in India.

“As far as the Indian monsoon is concerned, El Niño is the most influential factor, and we must take it very seriously,” Rajeevan told DW.

Water and electricity also affected

The effects are now emerging across India’s water and energy systems. Major reservoirs around the country ended the monsoon season with below-normal reserves, leaving farmers and the energy sector with a thinner buffer for the coming months.

Total reserves in the 178 reservoirs monitored by India’s Central Water Commission stood at 132.7 billion cubic metres, below the 10-year average of 151.1 billion cubic metres.

The shortfall has already begun to affect electricity generation. According to Grid India data, hydropower output fell by almost 16% in September compared with the same month a year earlier.

At the same time, the electricity deficit reached 560 million kilowatt-hours, its highest monthly level in more than three years. After sunset, when solar plants stop operating, the grid has fewer options to make up the shortfall.

Coal-fired power plants have been forced to shoulder a greater burden, but the sector faces its own difficulties. Data from India’s Central Electricity Authority show that around 40% of coal-fired plants have critically low fuel stocks, with supplies below a quarter of their required levels.

The government has ordered some privately owned industrial power plants to run at full capacity and feed surplus electricity into the national grid.

Manufacturers are already feeling the impact. “An uninterrupted power supply is vital for manufacturing units, because outages disrupt production cycles,” said Ashok Gupta, chairman of the Mohali Industries Association, which represents nearly 600 small and medium-sized businesses.

“Disruptions like these not only cause losses for manufacturers, but also lead to wastage of raw materials.”

Rural communities also affected

The economic effects of a poor monsoon may extend far beyond agriculture. Weaker harvests can put pressure on rural incomes, employment and consumer spending, while rising food prices add to pressure on household budgets.

Arun Kumar, a retired economics professor, said the effects could be broader than those captured by headline economic figures, particularly because much of India’s rural economy operates outside the formal sector.

“Economic development needs to be assessed using a wider set of indicators,” Kumar told DW. He said weaker agricultural production could push food prices up while squeezing incomes and purchasing power.

Himanshu, a development economist at Jawaharlal Nehru University in Delhi, described the situation as a “double shock” for rural households, as weakening agricultural incomes coincide with rising food prices.

“When agricultural incomes fall and food prices rise, rural households face pressure on their purchasing power,” he told DW.

He added that uneven rainfall could exacerbate the problem, causing some farming areas to suffer much greater losses than national rainfall figures suggest.

“The impact on rural consumption could also be significant, as households facing lower incomes and higher food costs have less money to spend on other goods and services.”

Rising food prices affect urban areas too

Urban households are also feeling the pressure. A September 2026 survey by India’s central bank found that people expected inflation to rise as food and fuel prices increasingly shaped consumer sentiment.

Sunita Sharma, a homemaker in New Delhi, said her regular shopping basket now costs hundreds of rupees more than it did a few months ago.

“We have no choice but to cut non-essential spending just to buy everyday food necessities,” she told DW.

Prices of several staples have risen sharply in recent months. An ISignal analysis using data from the Department of Consumer Affairs showed that onion prices rose 93% in September compared with a year earlier, while sugar prices increased by 28% and rice by about 8%.

The next challenge is the rabi, or winter, planting season. Farmers are preparing to sow wheat, mustard and chickpeas, but the success of the crops will depend heavily on how much moisture remains in the soil after the weak monsoon.

Rajeevan said the long-term outlook was becoming harder to predict as the global climate warmed.

“In a warming climate, longer dry spells and greater rainfall variability are possibilities,” he said. “Going forward, alongside the influence of El Niño, we must account for the effects of a warmer climate.”

Reddy, the farmer in Karnataka, is still waiting to hear whether he will get a job as a security guard in Bengaluru, while preparing to leave his farmland.