The Hindu Business Line : Monsoon active; all-India average normal

THE well-marked low-pressure area over North Bay of Bengal was just a churn away from being classified as a depression, as large parts of east central India and the peninsula were brought under a blanket of rain on Monday.

Re-classification of the two-day-old system will take place possibly during the next 24 hours, said Dr Akhilesh Gupta, Director, National Centre for Medium range Weather Forecasting (NCMRWF).

The low-pressure capped a week that saw the southwest monsoon turn around the fortunes of a number of met subdivisions, apart from improving performance on varying scales in others.

Normal, all-India: All-India rainfall during the season as on July 20 was normal (Actual -349.5 mm against a Normal of 349.6 mm). Going forward, only Jharkhand (-41 per cent) and Bihar (-28 per cent) posed some cause for worry since these areas will stay largely out of range of the low-pressure system that is expected to move west-northwest.

Nagaland-Mizoram-Manipur-Tripura (-52 per cent) may have failed to make any improvement during most part of the month, but expect to get some rain as the season progresses. That may not necessarily be the case with Bihar and Jharkhand, Dr Gupta said.

Turnaround in three: During the week ending July 20, real turnaround was witnessed in Eastern Uttar Pradesh (-22 per cent to -5 per cent); Marathwada (-42 to -10); and Tamil Nadu (-48 to -6). Other notable performances have been Assam and Meghalaya (-35 to -28); Jharkhand (-56 to -41); Bihar (-45 to -28); and Coastal Andhra Pradesh (-29 to -25).

Orissa (-17 to -20) and Konkan and Goa (-9 to -21) saw the situation deteriorate week-on-week.

But these, along with most of the listed as above, expect to be brought under rain cover during the ongoing spell. Marathwada, Telengana, Rayalaseema and Vidarbha, which used to be `problem areas' till sometime back, are all out of danger.

The zone-wise distribution of rain (June 1-July 20) was: Northwest - +21 per cent; Central - +9 per cent; South Peninsula - 0 per cent and the Northeast - -25 per cent. Out of the 36 met subdivisions, rainfall was excess in 11, normal in 18 and deficient in 7.

Active phase: Monsoon is getting into a `very active phase' with the cross-equatorial flow picking up dramatically during the past day or two. The west coast has already been brought under a wet spell.

Whenever the westerlies get strong in the south, areas to the north of the prevailing monsoon jet will go into an active phase while the south will be less active. This is part of the dynamics associated with monsoonal flow, and presents an interesting phase of the monsoon.

MTC in 48 hrs: In its update, the NCMRWF said a mid-tropospheric cyclonic circulation (MTC) is likely to form over northeast Arabian Sea and adjoining regions of Saurashtra and Kutch during the next 48 hours leading to enhancement of rainfall activity over north Konkan and Gujarat region.

Isolated to scattered rainfall is likely over Himachal Pradesh and Uttaranchal during the next two days. Isolated rains may also occur over Jammu and Kashmir, Punjab, Haryana, Delhi and West Uttar Pradesh.

With the movement of the monsoon system towards west-northwest, the rainfall activity over northwest India may increase.

Towards the east, fairly widespread rainfall with isolated heavy rain spells is expected over Orissa and Gangetic West Bengal during the next 4-5 days. Scattered to fairly widespread rainfall activity is likely over Bihar, Jharkhand, sub-Himalayan West Bengal and the Northeastern States during the next three days.

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