New Delhi, July 5 -- Srinagar: On a sweltering June morning, farmer Mir Shahnawaz moves between rows of unripe apples, adjusting the nozzle of his pesticide spray. It's a familiar ritual now-one he never imagined performing two decades ago.

"I have not grown rice since 2003," he says, eyes scanning his orchard. "We have faced back-to-back droughts. The rains do not come like they used to. Year after year, we waited, but the rainfall became scarce, and the canals that once nourished our fields ran dry. The limited irrigation we had was not enough to sustain a full paddy cycle."

Across the Valley, rising temperatures, erratic rainfall, and failing irrigation systems are forcing a reckoning: Is rice still viable here?

The data suggests no...