Kharif crop

Also called: Kharif season · Topic: Land Use, Farming Systems and Cropping Seasons in India · NCERT: Class 7, Ch 1 "The Story of Indian Farming"; Class 10, Ch 4 "Agriculture"; Class 12, Ch 3 "Land Resources and Agriculture"

Meaning

A kharif crop is a crop sown when the south-west monsoon starts (June-July) and harvested in September-October. These crops need high heat, high humidity and a lot of water. Kharif is India's monsoon or rainy-season crop. It is the season that depends most on the weather. It now produces about half of India's foodgrains.

Explanation

How the monsoon drives kharif (cause → process → result)

• Cause: land and sea heat up at different speeds.
• In summer, land heats up faster than the sea.

• This creates low pressure (an area where air rises and pressure falls) over north-west India.

• Process: moist winds are pulled in.

• The low pressure draws moist south-west winds in from the Indian Ocean.

• These winds bring the south-west monsoon rain from June to September.

• Result: a wet, warm growing season.

• Farmers sow when the first monsoon rains arrive.
• Rice, cotton and millets grow through the hot, rainy months.
• The crop is harvested in September-October, when the rains go back.

Conditions kharif crops need

• High temperature: these are tropical crops (crops of hot regions).
• High humidity: the air holds a lot of moisture during the monsoon.
• Plenty of water: the main water source is south-west monsoon rain.
• The Kharif name is an Arabic word. It has been used in India since Mughal times.
• The older Indian name for this season was Kedara, meaning "wet crops".

Kharif crops: north and south

• North India: rice, cotton, bajra, maize, jowar and tur (arhar).

• Also moong, urad, jute, soybean and groundnut.

• South India: rice, maize, ragi, jowar and groundnut.

• Why the south's list looks like its rabi list:
• The south is warm all year, with no cold winter.
• Tropical crops can grow in any season if the soil has enough moisture.

• So the same crop, such as rice, can be grown up to three times a year.

• Sugarcane is not a kharif crop. It takes almost a year to grow, so it stays in the field across seasons.

Kharif output and risks

• Current output:
• Kharif foodgrains in 2024-25: an estimated 1663.91 LMT (lakh metric tonnes; 10 LMT = 1 million tonnes) (Second Advance Estimates) [2].
• Kharif rice in 2024-25: an estimated 1206.79 LMT, a record. This was 74.20 LMT more than the 1132.59 LMT of 2023-24 [2].

• Kharif 2025-26 (First Advance Estimates): foodgrains 173.33 million tonnes, up 3.87 million tonnes [3].

  • rice: 124.504 million tonnes [3]
  • maize: 28.303 million tonnes, up 3.495 million tonnes [3]
  • coarse cereals: 41.414 million tonnes [3]
  • pulses: 7.413 million tonnes [3]

• Risks:

• Late monsoon: sowing is delayed, so the crop has less time to grow.
• Too much rain or floods: standing crops are destroyed.
• Breaks in the monsoon: a dry spell in the middle of the season damages rain-fed crops.

Where it occurs

• Traditional rain-fed kharif rice areas:
• Assam and West Bengal
• coastal Odisha
• Andhra Pradesh and Telangana
• Tamil Nadu and Kerala
• the Konkan coast (Maharashtra and Goa)

• Uttar Pradesh and Bihar

• New irrigated kharif rice areas: Punjab and Haryana.

• Rice spread here through canal and tubewell irrigation after the Green Revolution of the 1960s.

• These states get little rain, so their rice depends on irrigation, not the monsoon.

• Eastern India grows three paddy crops a year: Assam, West Bengal and Odisha grow aus, aman and boro.

• Aman (the winter crop) is the main crop, and it is sown in the monsoon.

• Aus is the autumn crop. Boro is the spring or summer crop, grown with irrigation.

• Three clear seasons (kharif, rabi, zaid) are found only in the north and the interior. There, the cold winter forces a change from kharif rice to rabi wheat.

Don't confuse with

• Rabi crop: sown in winter (October-December) and harvested in spring or early summer. It is watered by western disturbances (winter storms that start over the Mediterranean Sea) and by irrigation, not by the monsoon. Examples are wheat, barley, peas, gram and mustard.
• Zaid crop: a short summer crop grown from April to June, between the rabi harvest and the kharif sowing. It grows mostly on irrigated land. Examples are watermelon, muskmelon, cucumber and fodder.
• Aman rice vs kharif rice: aman is the name for the main, monsoon-sown paddy crop in Assam, West Bengal and Odisha. Those states also grow aus and boro rice, so their rice is not limited to kharif.
• Kedara vs Haimana: kedara (wet crops) is the old name for kharif. Haimana (winter crops) is the old name for rabi.

Prelims Hooks

• Kharif is sown when the south-west monsoon starts (June-July) and harvested in September-October.
• Kharif crops: rice, cotton, bajra, maize, jowar, tur, moong, urad, jute, soybean, groundnut. Wheat, gram and mustard are rabi crops, which is a common trap.
• Trap: rice is a kharif crop in the north. In the south, rice is also grown in rabi and zaid.
• Aus, aman and boro are three rice crops of Assam, West Bengal and Odisha. Aman is the main monsoon-sown crop.
• Kharif is an Arabic word used since Mughal times. Its older Indian name is kedara (wet crops).
• Kharif rice in 2024-25: a record 1206.79 LMT [2]. Kharif foodgrains in 2025-26 (First Advance Estimates): 173.33 million tonnes [3].

Mains Points

• Kharif depends on the monsoon (GS-I/III):
• A late, weak or broken monsoon cuts rain-fed kharif output in eastern and central India.
• Too much rain and floods destroy standing paddy.

• Responses include more irrigation, crops that can survive drought or floods, and crop insurance.

• Kharif rice in low-rain states (GS-III):

• Irrigated rice in Punjab and Haryana, which get little rain, puts heavy pressure on groundwater.
• It also locks farmers into the rice-wheat cycle.

• Meanwhile, rabi grain output (1645.27 LMT) is now almost equal to kharif (1663.91 LMT) in 2024-25, so India relies less on the monsoon season alone [2].

• Climate shapes the kharif calendar (GS-I):

• In the north, the cold winter makes kharif a separate season (rice in kharif, wheat in rabi).
• In the warm south, the same crops grow in kharif and rabi.
• In the east, three rice crops a year (aus, aman, boro) show how one crop can spread across all seasons.

Related concepts

• Rabi crop
• Zaid crop

Read more

• Cropping seasons: kharif, rabi and zaid