‘El Niño poses biggest threat to central India’: Sivananda Damodara Pai

THOUSANDS OF KILOMETRES away from the Indian subcontinent, a vast atmospheric system is shifting across the tropical Pacific Ocean, quietly signalling one of the most powerful drivers of global climate variability. At the centre of this system is the southern oscillation, a large-scale see-saw in air pressure between Tahiti in the eastern Pacific and Darwin in northern Australia. Scientists track this movement using the southern oscillation index (SOI), a simple measure of the pressure difference between the two regions. When the SOI falls into negative territory, it typically indicates strengthening El Niño conditions and a weakening of normal Pacific wind patterns. For India, El Niño is not merely a meteorological shift but a major economic warning, with implications for food prices, power demand, farm incomes and rural livelihoods. Understanding the ongoing monsoon, therefore, requires more than surface-level forecasts. It demands attention to the underlying climate dynamics shaping seasonal outcomes. According to Sivananda Damodara Pai, head of the Regional Meteorological Centre in Chennai, many parts of India could face the threat of below-normal rainfall because of El Niño, making it a key variable for national planning and risk management. Excerpts from an exclusive interview: This year is particularly concerning because El Niño is projected to intensify through the season. By September it is forecast to become moderate to strong. Q/ What is the forecast on the effect of El Niño in India this year? A/ El Niño is one of the phenomena that has an impact on climate patterns across the globe, not only in India. This year, because of El Niño, more parts of the country are likely to receive below-normal rainfall. Except for the northeast, where we are expecting normal or slightly above-normal rainfall, and some patches along the east coast, most parts of the country are likely to receive below-normal rainfall. Q/ Which all regions are at risk? A/ Central India, which includes Gujarat, Maharashtra, Madhya Pradesh, Chhattisgarh, Odisha, Andhra Pradesh and Telangana, which we call the monsoon zone, is at risk the most. This region receives a large amount of rainfall, and most of the agriculture here is mainly rain-fed. Things have improved in recent years, but the region is still dependent on rainfall. Punjab and Haryana have much better irrigation, and even Uttar Pradesh has improved irrigation facilities. So, water-intensive crops such as rice or sugarcane will be affected much more because they require more water. The strategic threat this year becomes clearer when we compare historical composite data. In El Niño years, the monsoon zone is dominated by deep red anomalies, with rainfall departures of 50-100mm below normal, indicating severe moisture stress. Conversely, during La Niña years, these same regions show positive rainfall anomalies. This year is particularly concerning because El Niño is projected to intensify through the season. By September it is forecast to become moderate to strong, coinciding with the critical grain-filling stage for Kharif crops. Q/ So, El Niño is projected to intensify, the farming sector needs to be managed appropriately. A/ Sowing has to be well thought out. For example, in Maharashtra, during the 2015 El Niño, on the advice of the India Meteorological Department, the chief minister told farmers to wait until there was enough rainfall before sowing. If you sow too early and the rains fail, you lose that crop and will have to resow. It is a big loss for farmers. So, they should wait for the appropriate time. Since we are expecting below-normal rainfall, farmers should go for short-duration varieties. Even for crops such as rice or sugarcane, they should use drought-resistant varieties. Some people advise not growing these crops at all, and instead go for millets and other crops that are traditionally drought resistant. These are what we call climate-smart adaptation strategies. Managing a delayed onset of the monsoon and increased dry spells through concentrated cultivation, using mulching (the process of covering soil with materials like dry leaves or straw) or applying agricultural waste to the soil surface to reduce evaporation and retain moisture near the root zone, shifting to drip irrigation and intercropping to maximise water-use efficiency, making a strategic shift to drought-resistant millets and short-duration varieties, mitigating reduced fodder availability and heat stress and addressing the increased incidence of sucking pests caused by higher temperatures and altered rainfall patterns will all help optimise irrigation and agricultural production. In fact, reducing the sowing area can itself be an effective strategy. Restricting sowing to about 50–70 per cent of the available land is essentially a loss-mitigation tactic. By focusing limited water resources on a smaller cultivated area, farmers can ensure a viable yield from part of their land rather than risking a 100 per cent crop failure across a much larger area. Q/ What are the learnings from the 2015 El Niño season? A/ In 2014 and 2015, the rainfall was below normal. In spite of that, crop yields in 2015 did not reduce much. We ended up with rainfall at 88 per cent of the Long Period Average (LPA) in 2015. This year, we have predicted around 90 per cent. The years 2023–2025 saw above-normal rainfall, leaving India with significantly higher reservoir storage levels entering the 2026 season. So, there is reservoir resilience. Then there is what we call the ‘Radha Mohan Singh’ benchmark. In 2015, the then Union agriculture minister Radha Mohan Singh announced a strategic roadmap to tackle drought based on the IMD’s revised forecast of 88 per cent of the LPA. This facilitated contingency plans for 580 districts, a model that has since been further refined for 2026. Apart from this, we are now into extended-range forecasting. The IMD now provides extended-range forecasts—a four-week outlook along with 10-day local forecasts. This allows real-time adjustments to expert advisories and irrigation schedules, helping to maintain production, price stability and manageable levels of self-sufficiency.