NEW DELHI: Despite heavy flooding in parts of the country in July, overall monsoon rains across the country were 3% deficient (the same as in 2019), primarily due to the increasingly skewed rainfall pattern observed in recent years, and the 11% deficiency recorded in June.
There is a 12% rainfall deficit over northwest India, a 4% deficiency over central India, and a 19% excess over Peninsular India. July has thus far recorded a 1.1% excess in rains, but most of these rains have been concentrated over Peninsular India, with central India receiving 5.9% excess and northeast India 5.4% excess.
A little over a fourth of the India Meteorological Department’s 36 meteorological divisions continue to record “deficient” rain.
Meteorologists are hopeful that the deficiency will be wiped out by the end of July. On July 1, IMD forecast a very active monsoon over the country as a whole during July based on data from 1971-2020, which shows average rainfall for July at about 280.4 mm.
“No system has formed over northwest India, so there have been several dry days. The entire Indo Gangetic Plains region has been dry for the first half of the month and the deficit in certain areas will continue. But by the end of the week, the low-pressure area is likely to form and bring heavy rains to central India. Rain has been very patchy in July also,” said Mahesh Palawat, vice president of climate and meteorology at Skymet Weather.
“July was not as good as expected, but in the next week, it will rain more. This deficiency should go away. There’s no need for panic,” said M Rajeevan, former secretary, ministry of earth sciences.
“We are hoping that with the formation of the low pressure area in central and adjoining North Bay of Bengal and its expected movement northwestwards, the deficiency may be addressed,” said D Sivananda Pai, senior scientist, IMD.
To be sure, the numbers highlight the diminishing utility of aggregates that IMD continues to use to classify the monsoon as normal or otherwise. A skewed distribution pattern with the aggregate being made up by a few days of heavy rain or extremely heavy rain could actually be counterproductive — hurting farmers and flooding cities.
