With a ‘normal’ rainfall in July after hugely deficient June, the sowing of Kharif crops—paddy, pulses, oilseeds, cotton and sugarcane – across the country has got a huge boost especially in the last fortnight.
This has somewhat allayed fears of a major flare-up in food prices. Consumer Price Index inflation rose to an 18-month high of 4.38% in June, led by higher food and fuel prices.
On Sunday, Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman said apart from imported inflation on account of the high prices of crude oil and its derivatives, a monsoon that is less than normal could also add to inflation.
Overall kharif sown area so far is at 78.73 million hectares (Mha), a 4.7% year-on-year decline. Until a fortnight ago, the sown area was 16% below last year’s level.
Sowing till July 24, according to the agriculture ministry, was over 70% of the “normal kharif area” of 110 mha. Sowing activities this season is likely to continue till the end of August, officials said.
Rice, the major kharif crop, has been sown across 23.44 Mha, a marginal decline of 2.57% y-o-y. Average area for paddy sowing stands at 41.2 Mha. At the beginning of the month, rice sown area was lagging 13% year-on-year. Improvement in rainfall in eastern and central parts of the country has led to the expansion of area under paddy acreage in the last fortnight, an official said.
Area under pulses acreage stands at 8.45 Mha, a decline of 6.9% y-o-y. Till a fortnight ago, area under pulses was down 23% compared to the 2025 level, mostly attributed to the scanty rainfall received until the end of June in central India.
However, Tur (pigeon pea), a key kharif pulse, has been sown across 3.11 Mha so far, still over 11% lower than last year, due to delayed monsoon arrivals in Maharashtra and Karnataka this season. “Sowing of pulses may not be impacted yet. Distribution of rainfall during August and September is likely to affect the yield of pulses, especially tur as it’s a long-duration crop,” Nitin Kalantri, managing director, Kalantry Food Products, a Latur, Maharashtra-based pulses processor, told FE.
Cotton acreage is 3.88% lower at 9.87 Mha y-o-y. Oilseeds—soyabean and groundnut—area lagged marginally 3.45% y-o-y, while the rainfall in central India, especially in Gujarat and Madhya Pradesh, has been adequate in July.
“The latest Kharif sowing data points to a gradual recovery in the season, but the pace of recovery is not very uniform across crops. While rice and oilseeds have shown encouraging progress, pulses and coarse cereals continue to lag, reflecting continued regional differences in field conditions,” M K Dhanuka, Chairman, Dhanuka Agritech, an agro-chemicals major, said.
Area under coarse cereals such as jowar, bajra, and ragi lags close to 12% year-on-year. Only sugarcane acreage, which started much earlier but is considered part of the kharif season, has shown a rise.
Overall monsoon deficit this season is at 16% on Monday, down from nearly 40% at the end of June. According to the India Meteorological Department (IMD), cumulative rainfall during June 1-July 27 is 342.5 millimetres (mm) against the benchmark longer period average (LPA) of 408.9 mm, which is still in the ‘deficient’ range.
Under the influence of a depression over Odisha and West Bengal coasts, IMD forecasts rainfall over northwest, central India, east and north-east regions during the next one week.