This report, published by the Centre for Science and Environment (CSE), is an attempt to build an evidence base on the frequency and expanding geography of extreme weather events in India. It provides season-by-season, month-by-month, and region-by-region analyses of extreme weather events and the loss and damage they caused in the first nine months of 2022.

All Indian states are significantly climate vulnerable and the gap between the least vulnerable state (Maharashtra) and the most vulnerable state (Jharkhand) is small, as per the Centre’s “Climate Vulnerability Assessment for Adaptation Planning in India Using a Common Framework 2019-20”. Yet, robust data on extreme weather events, which are increasing in frequency and intensity due to climate change, is not available publicly. This happens because government agencies use different definitions and data collection sources, which obscures the bigger picture.

The CSE report has sourced its data on extreme events from two key government sources: IMD and the Disaster Management Division (DMD) of the Union Ministry of Home Affairs. In addition, it has scanned media reports to track the events—particularly in the pre-monsoon period when official data is inadequate. The media reports have also provided further information on the extent of loss and damage.

Brief Highlights

India recorded extreme weather events on 241 of the 273 days from January 1 to September 30, 2022. This means that close to 90 per cent of the first nine months of this year, India had an extreme weather event breaking in one or more parts of the country. These disasters included heat and cold waves, cyclones, lightning to heavy rain, floods and landslides.

These disasters have claimed 2,755 lives, affected 1.8 million hectares (ha) of crop area, destroyed over 416,667 houses and killed close to 70,000 livestock. This estimation of loss and damage is probably an underestimate as data for each event is not collated, nor are the losses of public property or crop loss calculated.

Full report can be downloaded at https://www.cseindia.org/climate-india-2022-11463