Monsoon rains are expected to arrive in India by June 7, about a week later than usual, according to the weather office.
“After the monsoon hit the shores of Bay of Bengal, most parts of the country, including the central, northwest and western India, will get above normal rains," Laxman Singh Rathore, director general of the Indian Meteorological Department (IMD) said on Thursday.
“These rains will bring an end to the drought plaguing India.”
“Conditions remain favourable for further advancement of southwest monsoon into some more parts of south and east central Bay of Bengal. Conditions are becoming favourable for onset of southwest monsoon over Kerala during next 4-5 days,” the IMD forecast said.
Private weather agency SkyMet has also said the countdown for monsoon has begun, though the season had officially started on June 1. Any rains in the country during the June 1 to September 30 period is considered as monsoon rains. This time, India has received only 2 mm showers compared to an average of 2.7 mm pre monsoon showers across all 36 meteorological divisions in India.
Kerala, which is the main contributor of rainwater in India, recorded moderate to heavy rains and some extremely heavy spells of showers. The private weather agency flagged a reversal in trend in this year's monsoon.
“Normally, we see, Northeast India picking up pace along with southern region, and East India follows much later. But this time, the pattern has been reversed as gangetic West Bengal, Jharkhand, Bihar, Sub-Himalayan West Bengal and Sikkim received light to moderate rains. Assam, Meghalaya and Arunchal Pradesh were also short on rains,” said Jatin Singh, the CEO of SkyMet.
Meanwhile, the stock market ended on a positive note over the above-normal monsoon forecast, notwithstanding the prediction that it could be delayed by seven days. The rains are now awaited to bring to an end a three-year drought spell across many regions in the country.
“If rains come earlier, certain agricultural products will see a dip in prices. This trend will follow once the monsoon advances across the country. It would not be an overstatement to say that rains will bring relief to food inflation by a large extent,” said Shaktikanta Das, secretary, department of economic affairs.
