ABSTRACT
Droughts can be characterized by different densities and intensities of variables like rainfall, weather, temperature, and resilience, and can have economic, social, and environmental impacts, and hence they do not have a single unanimous definition. Factors that mostly influence the recurring droughts in India are the status of soil moisture, surface, and groundwater, agroclimatic features, cropping choices, cropping patterns, agricultural practices, availability of fodder, and socioeconomic vulnerabilities of the population. India experienced 25 major drought years from 1871 to 2015, which is defined as years with All India Summer Monsoon Rainfall (AISMR) less than one standard deviation below the mean. Since its independence, India has been exposed to 15 worst-hit droughts including the recent droughts in Maharashtra and some southern states. Previous studies have identified four different types of droughts and their frequencies in India from 1981 to 2013 and stated that India has faced seven drought years in each of the categories of meteorological, hydrological, soil moisture, and vegetation type droughts. However, there is a need to account a new form of droughts named ecological droughts which have larger impacts on ecosystems, increasing vulnerabilities and affecting human beings. There is a potential risk of ecological drought as one of the most impending disasters in the coming days, but knowing the very nature and typology of drought and identification, quantification and overall accounting of ecosystems and ecosystem services would help us monitor, adopt, and mitigate these droughts by following ecosystem-centric approaches of rejuvenating ecosystems and appropriate policy interventions .
