The chief minister was quick to recognize the crisis and called an emergency meeting of his ministers last week. He has sent them scrambling to the districts for a field report on the 'drought-like situation'. Under the new drought protocol released by the Centre in December last year, an area can be tagged drought-affected only if it passes a series of complex checks.

According to a government spokesman, 34 of the 51 districts have received deficient rainfall (though 45 have not met the normal levels). Usually, such a situation would lead to the declaration of drought by the state and an SOS to the Centre, which would then release funds. But it is not going to be as simple this time.

Fifteen months ahead of the elections, Chouhan faces a major crisis, perhaps the toughest in his 13 years as CM. It's all the more crucial because the bad monsoon has come after the violent farmer agitation in June that shook the administration. The government has been in damage-control mode since then. Chouhan sought to assuage the farmers by hiking the procurement price of onion and procuring pulses for the first time. The farmer turbulence was yet to die out when monsoon dealt a double whammy.

Till the middle of September 676.5mm of rainfall was recorded in the state, which is 25 percent less than normal (904.8mm). Places such as Shivpuri have been 51 percent deficient. In fact, the whole of Gwalior-Chambal region is almost 50 percent rain-deficient, said a weather official in Bhopal. Similarly, drought-prone Bundelkhand is 40-43 percent short of its rainfall normal rainfall rate. Even Balaghat — the rice bowl of MP – has 38 percent shortfall.

Though the government has not yet officially declared a drought, a tight-lipped Chouhan has said he would "take care of the farmers". When reporters asked the CM in Chattarpur — a drought affected district of Bundelkhand — about his plans, he preferred to keep silent.

A senior official said that under the new rules, four things need to come together for evaluation of drought: First, the rainfall figures will be obtained from IMD, then remote sensing data will be obtained from the Mahalanobis National Crop Forecast Centre, followed by data on the water levels in reservoirs from the Central Water Commission as well as data on the underground water table from the Central Groundwater Board. If a region meets all four parameters, the state will become eligible for 100 percent drought assistance. If three parameters are met, the Centre will give 75 percent funds and the state has to pitch in 25 percent. In case only one parameter is met, the state will have to provide funds entirely from its own coffers, sources said.

According to Rajesh Rajora, principal secretary of agriculture, the authorities have started mobilising farmers ahead of the Rabi season, advising them to sow varieties of wheat that require less water or crops like gram and masoor, which do not require much water.

Farmers of Madhya Pradesh are not used to cultivating varieties of wheat like Sharbati, as the per-acre yield of these varieties is low. The Lokman variety is most popular among farmers because it is cost effective, says G S Kaushal, former director of agriculture.

There was a time when Madhya Pradesh was known as a ‘soya state’. But the situation is so serious that farmers are being advised to refrain from sowing soybean. In fact the area under soybean has been declining for years because of erratic rainfall and the rising import of soya oil from the international market. The worst affected is Malwa region, which produces almost 20 percent of the country's oilseed. The area under soybean cultivation has gone down by 12 lakh hectares in the last four years and farmers are shifting to pulses and paddy. In 2013, the area under soybean cultivation was 63 lakh hectares, which dropped to about 50 lakh hectares this year. (IPA Service)