The Hindu Business Line : With 5 days to go, rain deficit cut to 1%

Thiruvananthapuram, Sept. 25 All-India rain deficit has narrowed further to one per cent as per updated statistics on Wednesday, with the two Met subdivisions left sharing the burden improving their individual performance week-on-week.

These subdivisions are West Madhya Pradesh (-20 per cent against -22 per cent) and Nagaland-Manipur-Mizoram-Tripura (-23 against -24). With five more days left for the season to end, it is likely that the latter might still be able to improve its position. The same cannot be said about the former, which has to contend with dry westerlies fanned by a withdrawing monsoon.

The withdrawal normally kicks off around September 1 from West Rajasthan ushering in dry weather. The process tracks a northeast-southwest arc steered by incoming westerly winds.

India Meteorological Department (IMD) expected subdued weather to prevail over the northwest, west and central India over the next five days. But full-scale withdrawal has been held up with rains being reported from Rajasthan – isolated over the west and better spread over the east - as late as Wednesday but slightly weaker a day after.

By this time of the year, the withdrawal is normally complete across the northern and western parts. But rain waves paraded by erstwhile Bay of Bengal depression 02B over Bihar, Orissa and parts of Maharashtra doused the prospects.

Last year also, the withdrawal process was delayed, and could get a move on from September 30 only. But then on, it took only the 15 days to complete the formalities.

GOOD DISTRIBUTION

The overall rainfall this season may have been a tad low compared to the same period last year, but the distribution has been among the best during the past six years.

The number of subdivisions getting normal or above normal rainfall this year is 34 (out of 36), the highest since 2003. Those in the deficient rainfall category are merely two, the lowest since 2003.

Meanwhile, the fairly widespread rainfall over coastal Orissa and West Bengal is forecast to continue for another day as the causative feeble circulation stayed put over North Bay of Bengal on Thursday.

BAY CIRCULATION

There are now indications that a string of thundershowers can still hold out over the central and west-central peninsula during later this week. Numerical weather prediction models see a Bay circulation docking along the southeast coast and crossing the peninsula to slide into the Arabian Sea off the Karnataka coast. This will drag a belt of poorly organised showers into the peninsula and into the Arabian Sea.

In this manner, the withdrawal process could run into a hurdle over peninsular India during the week leading up to September 30, the normal date for monsoon to sign off from the landmass.

Though remote, the Bay would still have to contend with the threat of remnant circulations from two major land-falling typhoons – Hagupit followed by Jangmi – originating in the Northwest Pacific. Sea-surface temperatures in the Equatorial Indian Ocean and adjoining southwest Bay are just right for these stray circulations to mature.

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