Drought characteristics over Deccan Plateau Region of India

Key messages

• A persistent hazard - challenge to livelihoods of the most vulnerable communities, with cascading impacts on overall national development;
• Technical aspects – monitoring, early warning and improvements – ongoing and planned – need to focus on “practical” tools that can be embedded and sustained in operational systems that capture dynamic vulnerability and strengthening existing systems;
• Changing morphology of droughts in the Indian context – large-scale slow onset low-frequency to high-frequency localized impact – flash droughts;
• Institutional arrangements & challenges, relevance and consequences in the future context.

This case study is a contribution to the GAR Special Report on Drought 2021.