Uttar Pradesh Higher Education Minister Yogendra Upadhyay has proposed removing nursery rhymes like "Rain Rain, Go Away" and "Johnny, Johnny! Yes, Papa" from the syllabus, deeming them to promote selfishness and dishonesty, and advocating for songs that encourage water for crops instead. This sentiment is explored alongside an explanation of the monsoon's scientific basis, tracing it from ancient mythological interpretations involving deities like Indra, Varuna, and Surya to the modern scientific understanding of the Walker Cycle, influenced by factors such as solar heating, ocean currents, and geographical features like mountains. The article highlights challenges to the monsoon, including the El Niño phenomenon which can divert moisture away from India, and the potential positive impact of the Indian Ocean Dipole, a difference in sea-surface temperatures. It concludes by noting that the forecast for reduced rainfall this year, around 90% of the normal quota, is concerning given agriculture's heavy reliance on the monsoon, reminiscent of severe droughts experienced in 2015, and that meteorologists are monitoring the Indian Ocean Dipole for potential mitigation.

Uttar Pradesh Higher Education Minister Yogendra Upadhyay has proposed removing nursery rhymes like "Rain Rain, Go Away" and "Johnny, Johnny! Yes, Papa" from the syllabus, deeming them to promote selfishness and dishonesty, and advocating for songs that encourage water for crops instead. This sentiment is explored alongside an explanation of the monsoon's scientific basis, tracing it from ancient mythological interpretations involving deities like Indra, Varuna, and Surya to the modern scientific understanding of the Walker Cycle, influenced by factors such as solar heating, ocean currents, and geographical features like mountains. The article highlights challenges to the monsoon, including the El Niño phenomenon which can divert moisture away from India, and the potential positive impact of the Indian Ocean Dipole, a difference in sea-surface temperatures. It concludes by noting that the forecast for reduced rainfall this year, around 90% of the normal quota, is concerning given agriculture's heavy reliance on the monsoon, reminiscent of severe droughts experienced in 2015, and that meteorologists are monitoring the Indian Ocean Dipole for potential mitigation.

Uttar Pradesh Higher Education Minister Yogendra Upadhyay has proposed removing nursery rhymes like "Rain Rain, Go Away" and "Johnny, Johnny! Yes, Papa" from the syllabus, deeming them to promote selfishness and dishonesty, and advocating for songs that encourage water for crops instead. This sentiment is explored alongside an explanation of the monsoon's scientific basis, tracing it from ancient mythological interpretations involving deities like Indra, Varuna, and Surya to the modern scientific understanding of the Walker Cycle, influenced by factors such as solar heating, ocean currents, and geographical features like mountains. The article highlights challenges to the monsoon, including the El Niño phenomenon which can divert moisture away from India, and the potential positive impact of the Indian Ocean Dipole, a difference in sea-surface temperatures. It concludes by noting that the forecast for reduced rainfall this year, around 90% of the normal quota, is concerning given agriculture's heavy reliance on the monsoon, reminiscent of severe droughts experienced in 2015, and that meteorologists are monitoring the Indian Ocean Dipole for potential mitigation.

Uttar Pradesh Higher Education Minister Yogendra Upadhyay doesn’t like the nursery rhymes ‘Rain Rain, Go Away’ and ‘Johnny, Johnny! Yes, Papa’. Should the rain be asked to stay away, just because a Little Tommy wants to play? he asks. And that brat Johnny? Isn’t he the one who steals sugar and tells lies?

The twosome, mantriji thinks, is a bad influence on kids. He wants their removal from the syllabi, because they teach selfishness and dishonesty. Rather, kids should be taught songs like ‘Kale megha pani de, pani de (O dark clouds, give us water)’. Pious thought!

Upadhyay has a point. Indra isn’t a god to be trifled with. Don’t we know how he withheld rains over petty spites? Once because people began worshipping Surya and Varuna instead of him; another time when they did puja to Mount Govardhan. In the first incident, the two other gods intervened to humble Indra; in the Govardhan tale, Krishna taught him a lesson. Incidentally, both stories are told in Upadhyay’s Uttar Pradesh more than elsewhere.

Monsoon rains are produced by an interplay of Indra, Varuna and Surya. Scientists call this the Walker Cycle after Sir Gilbert Walker, a 20th century British scientist who explained how the monsoon is generated. That was perhaps the biggest India-related weather find after Hippalus detected the southwest monsoon in the 1st century BC.

What did Walker find? First some physics. The sun (Surya) heats up the Indian landmass every summer, causing low pressure over certain areas. The wet winds from (Varuna’s) Indian Ocean blow into the subcontinent. The several mountains (the Govardhans) block them, forcing them to rise. Their temperature drops, and they release the water they carry. That’s the physics of our monsoon.

Now some geography. On reaching somewhere near Kanyakumari, the winds split into two branches. The Arabian Sea branch hits Kerala, and moves northward along the Western Ghats, showering over Karnataka and Goa. The Bay of Bengal branch travels towards Bengal and the northeast. It unloads its stuff over those regions, turn westward into the Indo-Gangetic Plain wetting them on the way. That’s how most of India gets drenched.

So what’s the problem? Is the Walker cycle getting straightened? No, but there is something more to the monsoon story, someone like Vritra the Asura who swallowed the world's waters and caused drought. We call it El Nino. It is a phenomenon in which the atmosphere over the central and eastern Pacific gets warmer, and pulls away part of the moist air to those regions instead of over India. The result: fewer wet clouds reach India; less rain falls.

At times a saviour has appeared—a phenomenon called the Indian Ocean Dipole which is about the difference in sea-surface temperatures between the western and eastern tropical Indian Ocean. A positive IOD is good for India, as the temperature difference generates low pressure over the Arabian Sea, enhancing the flow of wet winds toward the subcontinent and boosting rainfall.

Indra is angry again, say weathermen; India will get less rain this year than in a normal year—about 90 per cent of the normal quota. The last such shortage was in 2015. That year we had severe droughts and crop failures. The problem is that the monsoon accounts for 80 per cent of the rainfall in India, and Indian farming is still heavily dependent on the rains. A few days’ delay in monsoon arrival ruins several crops. With Hormuz oil muchly blockaded, both oil and water are going to get scarce.

Last heard, weathermen are on the lookout for IOD.

prasannan@theweek.in

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