Abnormally dry weather or an exceptional lack of water compared with normal conditions constitutes droughts. In September, when the state government “declared drought” in much of Maharashtra, in street conversations, the year was described as dushkal. Voice and lived reality embedded in diverse ecologies and social experiences will need a place alongside predictive science and preventative measures to reduce the accumulation of historical disadvantage in drought-affected groups and communities. Creating accountability for arid landscapes, drying aquifers, lost crops and burdened rural women requires more inclusive understandings of human–environment relationships.

Droughts rarely occupy public attention beyond the seasons of scarcity described through monsoonal variations. If people in the past watched the skies as they prepared for the sowing season, at present they monitor reservoir levels. Wealthier city people, concerned about their dwindling drinking water services, create more local storage; poorer communities, in the same place, queue up, cut back and pay more for poorer quality water, often from informal providers. As the summer monsoon progresses, rural water distress takes centre stage since it signals households, especially women, escalating suffering linked to their water collection roles; farming livelihoods grow in precarity and production shortfalls are projected by observers. Such unfolding of events is about the complex intertwining of waterscapes with a historical development of farming styles framed by debates about public policies.

In this contribution, I examine how/whether the rhetoric and narratives shaping public understandings about drought accentuate (or contest) social rights-centric understandings of who and what is at risk, which further determines what can be done to reduce the accumulation of disadvantage in drought-affected groups and communities. If droughts are framed as a natural hazard that affects all of us by diminishing our collective well-being, does it increase sensitivity towards those who are less cushioned against their ravage and hence may produce solidarity? It depends on how societal needs and rights, duties and responsibilities are perceived; it is also informed by how droughts are understood and communicated. Even as scientific evidence about human-induced climate change accumulates, critical geographers like Noel Castree (2026) argue that the inability to view such phenomena from “plural, inclusive and wide angle” perspectives may result in harm for countless communities and societies. In agrarian societies, droughts are prominent natural hazards that are subjected to widespread analysis in light of their capacity to cause widespread and long-term distress and dislocation across large landscapes and communities. On 26 September, when the state government “declared drought” in 74% of all talukas of Maharashtra, in street-level conversations in Mumbai, the year was being described as dushkal.

Definitions and Measurements

Abnormally dry weather or an exceptional lack of water compared with normal conditions constitutes the hazard posed by drought, but drought is not simply about aridity or water scarcity. Drought risk and the threat posed to people, societies and environments arise from the potential for dry weather to cause harm, the exposure of communities or environments, the vulnerability of those exposed to harm, and the capacity of society and ecosystems to undertake prospective, corrective or compensatory actions to reduce that risk.

The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), Sixth Assess­ment Report (AR6) defines meteo­rological drought as precipitation deficit, hydro­logical drought as streamflow deficits and agricultural and ecological droughts as soil moisture deficits caused by the failure of rain or extremely hot or dry weather. El Niño/La Niño and the Southern Oscillation (ENSO) describe the naturally occurring phenomenon involving fluctuating ocean temperatures in the central and eastern equatorial Pacific accompanied by changes in the atmosphere. Based on scientific models of such climate patterns leading to heavy rains, floods and drought can be predicted in advance. Effects of El Niño events include warm and dry conditions and (generally) less than summer normal monsoon rainfall in India. Climate change is believed to be increasing the impact of El Niño, resulting in both intense heat and heavier precipitation. The south-west monsoon brings summer rain to northern and central India from June–September and the north-east monsoon brings rains to peninsular India from October to December. Droughts can take place if rainfall is deficient or erratic in either of the two monsoon periods (Sengupta 2022: 6). 

Severe droughts affected all regions of India, according to meteorological evidence in the following years: 1966, 1972, 1986 and 2002. The EM-DAT database identifies 13 drought years between 1950 and 2022: 1964, 1967, 1973, 1979, 1983, 1987, 1993, 1996, 2001, 2002, 2009, 2016, 2019. Two major droughts occur­red every decade except for 1950. These numbers match the information provided by the 2016 Indian drought manual. According to the manual, the seven droughts that occurred between 1899 and 1920, three droughts between 1941 and 1965 and 10 droughts between 1965 and 1987 were due to El Niño Southern Oscillation (ENSO) (Sengupta 2022: 6). Monsoon conditions are also influenced by the Indian Ocean Dipole, a difference in sea surface temperatures in opposite parts of the Indian Ocean. Scientific and technical terms about drought characteristics and causation are increasingly mainstream. From schoolchildren, to cab drivers, migrant workers and farmers, in Maharashtra, where a historical drought year is unfolding, can hold a discussion about how climate is changing and the El Niño condition is prevailing.

In official communiques and the press, the current drought is being compared to the drought year of 1972. An online history board created by the digital team of Marathi-language newspaper, e-sakal, asks visitors to view and learn about the “Dushkal” of 1972 through AI-generated images, that are described as “old black and white images.”1 While scientific droughts may constitute comparable pheno­mena, drought experiences of contemporary communities are different, not only due to the........

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