IMD prediction brings cheer to Telangana farmers amid Covid gloom

HYDERABAD: Amidst the Covid-19 gloom, the India Meteorological Department on Wednesday announced some good news — Southwest Monsoon will be normal this year. The IMD Hyderabad officials said that this applies to Telangana too. The news comes as a relief for the farmers who have been facing tough times due to the lockdown in place across the country and also the losses they suffered due to recent extreme weather conditions in the State.

The IMD has also revised the onset and withdrawal date of monsoon for various States, including Telangana. The variation is of three to seven days. However, in case of Hyderabad the new onset date date is June 8 as against June 7 announced earlier and the new withdrawal date is October 15, instead of October 14. The variation between old and new onset dates in Andhra Pradesh cities is higher. For Ongole, it has been changed from June 4 to June 8 and for Machilipatnam from June 5 to June 13. 

When contacted, Director of IMD Hyderabad K Nagaratna said that the national forecast of normal monsoon would apply to Telangana as well. However, in May the IMD would release a regional forecast, which would include forecast for the peninsula. The IMD in its media release said that the Southwest Monsoon seasonal (June to September) rainfall over the country as a whole is likely to be 100 per cent of the Long Period Average (LPA), with a model error of plus or minus five percent. 

This is based on the IMD’s statistical model, which showed that there is a 41 per cent chance of normal Southwest Monsoon but only 20 per cent chance that it will be below normal. According to the dynamic model of IMD, there is 70 per cent probability that the Southwest Monsoon rainfall this year will be above normal. One reason behind is that according to some models, there is a chance of La Nina conditions prevailing in the second half of monsoon season.