Shafiqul Alam/ Bureau Chief at AFP News Agency
When the first showers of Monsoon drenched the Bengal Delta, our ancestors would breathe a sigh of relief. Some of them would offer prayers in gratitude at a Sufi shrine or in a Kali temple or a Buddhist Kiang. The monsoon would hit our shores between the first day of June and the 15th. If it was delayed, it would create panic attacks in the villages.

Even in the 1970s we were heavily reliant on Monsoon. But things began the change in the 1980s when shallow pumps used to extract underground water started becoming popular in the rural areas. A pump fitted with Chinese or Italian motor would cost less than 100 dollars. And soon enough the entire country was using pumps to extract groundwater for crop plantations.

So, in just a matter of a decade, we overcome the caprice of a poor Monsoon. Better rains during the Monsoon was still welcome as it would drive down cost of rice production. But if rains don’t come and are too irregular to ensure a better Aman harvest, it does not matter because we have groundwater to compensate the loss in rainfalls.And soon pumps revolutionised farming in the winter Boro season.

You won’t have any rains in the dry months of December through May. And yet you can grow rice during this dry harsh weather, thanks to irrigation with pump-extracted groundwater. And by late 1990s, Boro crop became so big that it is now the biggest crop.in the Bengal Delta — much bigger than the Monsoon-dependent Aman.

In India, farmers in much of the country of 1.4 billion people still heavily depend on Monsoon. A poor Monsoon means a poor crop and its impact is immediately felt in the bazaars and in the economy. Poor Indian Monsoon is a big news for financial news behemoths like Reuters and Bloomberg. The jitters that a poor Indian Monsoon triggers send shivers in the global rice markets — its food security.

Last year I asked some of the young farmers in my village about the term, Monsoon. Believe me, they could not tell much about it. They are aware of Barsha — the season of rains — but what actually Monsoon means or why it is so important they could not tell. They still believe rains are a blessing for their crop, especially for the growth of Jute stalks.

But if there are no rains, it does not matter. They will ask a Pump.owner to extract groundwater to their farm overnight so that they can work on the land the next day. But what actually was Monsoon? Some would ask. And it caused some considerable pains for one of my 75-year-old distant uncles to explain what is Monsoon and why it mattered to thousands of generations of our ancestors in this Bengal Delta.