Patna, Bhubaneswar: The entire country is sizzling under heat wave, and the Meteorological Department has issued a severe heat wave warning across North and Central India.
India is worried, and now the Prime Minister's Office is tracking the monsoon.
"PMO is keeping an eye on monsoon. We will come to you in two three days with details and response," said Prithviraj Chavan, MoS, PMO.
The Centre has asked 10 states on the critical list to submit a report by Thursday. These states could be affected by the delayed monsoon.
The government is preparing to deal with the impact of the missing rains.
The biggest fear right now is the impact that this delay of monsoon is going to have on agriculture as 60 per cent of India's crops are rain fed.
If it happens, the impact will be quite detrimental on states like Bihar where according to a study, 40 per cent of all paddy seeds are planted this season.
For the moment, some state governments have announced a subsidy to the farmers on diesel so that they can continue to use their pumps for irrigation. But that is just a stop gap measure.
Further delay in a good monsoon will eventually result in the states reducing the water supply for irrigation and conserving it for drinking purposes instead.
Extreme temperatures that seem to be soaring everyday are not helping. Most of India's cities are battling with temperatures over 40 degrees Centigrade everyday.
Orissa is also burning with temperatures running as high as 46 degrees Centigrade.
Some states are already worried that they may be staring at a probable drought. The impact on environment is also a worrying factor as a forest fire is growing in Jammu.
Today there was slight drizzle in a couple of cities, but the monsoon is expected by the June 25. Hopefully by then the rain gods would relent.