The late monsoons have meant that a very large percentage of crops have not been planted, impacting livelihoods and food prices. Water is still scarce for irrigation and drinking. As always, our politicians blame the rain gods, but as found out that the reasons for the water crisis are man made - whether it's manufacturing water shortage in cities to justify thousands of crores of dams or how the crisis in West and Central India acutely hit by drought may have been exacerbated by the need to supply uninterrupted electricity during election time.