IMD forecasts below normal rain over a large area in July, sowing likely to be hampered

Rainfall over the country as a whole, during the month of July, is expected to be normal and quantitatively to be 94 to 106 per cent of the Long Period Average (LPA).

However, a large geographical area covering northwest, southern peninsula, and some areas of central and eastern India, would receive below normal rainfall, Mrutyunjay Mohapatra, Director General, India Meteorological Department (IMD) said on Thursday.

Below normal rainfall is forecast over south Kerala, west and north Andhra Pradesh, Konkan and Vidarbha in Maharashtra, north Gujarat, north Rajasthan, Delhi, Haryana, Punjab, north Uttar Pradesh, northern Odisha, West Bengal, southern Sikkim and Arunachal Pradesh during July.

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As a result, the Met office has flagged the need to provide irrigation support to all ongoing transplantation and sowing activities across India. However, rice transplantation is unlikely to be affected due to this subdued rainfall phase expected to last till the early second week of July.

“The early sown crops will need to be provided with irrigation and provision for adequate power supply for the same is important. Efforts will be needed to retain soil moisture in the fields and all agriculture activities must be closely monitored,” Mohapatra said, while releasing the IMD’s July forecast.

Contributing to about 35 per cent of the season’s rainfall, July rain is crucial for agriculture and reservoir replenishment.

Monsoon has remained in a break-phase since June 19 and will remain subdued till July 7.

These active and break phases are normal in a season. Subdued rainfall is mainly due to the lack of favourable large-scale atmospheric features, weak phase of Madden Julian Oscillation (MJO) and no formation of low pressure system over the Bay of Bengal, which is expected till the end of first week of July.

“Rainfall activity will slowly begin to revive after July 7, but the full active phase is expected only after July 10. Around then, a low pressure system will develop over the east-central region of the Bay of Bengal. Thereafter, enhanced rainfall will continue till the end of this month,” said Mohapatra.

The IMD chief also pointed that monsoon will not advance over the entire country close to its normal date of July 8, this year.

“Though the monsoon advanced over many states ahead of its schedule, it will not cover the entire country by July 8. However, a standard deviation of seven days and monsoon covering all of India by July 15 is still considered normal,” he said.

Over north and northwest India — Delhi, Punjab, Haryana, Chandigarh and Rajasthan — where the monsoon is yet to arrive, heatwave conditions will begin to subside by Friday.

“The frequency of heatwaves in July is less, but they have been climatologically recorded in the past. This occurs especially when the monsoon is in its weak phase,” the IMD head said.