The monsoon's progress will be reviewed at a meeting that the Union Food Minister will hold with states on Friday.
The Narendra Modi government has prepped a nine-point contingency plan in case of drought, but has withheld details to avoid panic. It believes that rain in Delhi and Mumbai since yesterday is a sign that the stalled monsoon is now progressing again and it might not need the plan after all. (
Monsoon Finally Lashes Mumbai With Heavy Rains, Slows Down Traffic)The drought mitigation plan envisages more diesel and seed subsidy for farmers and also relief from loans and interest as part of alternate plans of irrigation if rains are scanty.
India is one of the world's biggest producers and consumers of rice, corn, cooking oil, sugar and cotton and relies heavily on the annual monsoon rains as nearly half of its farmland is rainfed. (
How Government Plans to be Drought-Ready: 10 Points)
The monsoon's progress and ground situation will be reviewed at a meeting that the Union Food Minister Ram Vilas Paswan will hold with states on Friday. (
Monsoon to Pick Up Next Week; Government Prepared for Shortfall)The Cabinet met yesterday to discuss the government's other big worry - rising prices, with the late monsoon pushing up the cost of vegetables and dairy products.
The cabinet decided to place a limit on the quantity of onions and potatoes wholesalers can stock with them to curb hoarding, which is being blamed for the recent spike in prices, said minister for telecommunications and information technology Ravi Shankar Prasad after the meeting. The states would decide on the cap, he said. (
Will Limit Stockholding of Onions and Potatoes, Says Government)
"We think there are enough potatoes and onions in the country and there's no need to panic," Mr Prasad said. Earlier on Wednesday, India raised the minimum export price for onion by 67 percent to augment domestic supply and keep prices under control.
The government will also release additional 50 lakh tonnes of rice to the poor.
Shailesh Nayak, a top bureaucrat in the Earth Sciences Ministry said on Wednesday that monsoon rains have revived in central and northern parts of India known for soybean and sugarcane cultivation, but warned that the country is still expected to have below-average monsoon this year. (
Worst Impact of Poor Monsoon Likely to Be in West India: Agriculture Minister)Rainfall in July and August is likely to be better than in June, the first month of the four-month monsoon season when the precipitation was 43 percent below average across India.