The monsoon managed to break a 20-day-long hiatus after it made an early onset over Kerala on May 24, and has on Monday advanced into remaining parts of north Arabian Sea and Gujarat, even as an incoming western disturbance dug deeper with prospects of animating an existing circulation in the neighbourhood to rustle up a low-pressure area by Tuesday.

This ‘low’ would predate an anticipated counterpart over the eastern parts of country by a few days as the core monsoon activity prepares to shift from West Coast and South Peninsula to Central India, East India and adjoining North-West India this week.

Quantum jump

On Monday, the monsoon entered parts of Madhya Pradesh, and had covered entire Konkan, Madhya Maharashtra, Vidarbha, Chhattisgarh and Odisha. Thus its northern limit managed to effect a quantum jump to drape itself along Veraval, Bhavnagar, Vadodara, Khargone, Amravati, Durg, Bargarh, Chandbali, Sandhead Island and Balurghat breaking a long hiatus.

India Meteorological Department (IMD) said conditions are favourable for its further advance into some more parts of Gujarat and Madhya Pradesh; remaining parts of Vidarbha, Chhattisgarh and Odisha; almost entire parts of hills of West Bengal and Jharkhand; some parts of Bihar and East Uttar Pradesh during next 2-3 day as its eastern (Bay) arm too gains decisive traction.

Western disturbance

The incoming western disturbance is expected to initially prompt an existing circulation over south Gujarat and neighbourhood to deepen as a low-pressure over the same region as early as Tuesday. The IMD expects the ‘low’ to become more marked and move north-north-westwards by Wednesday and likely get scooped up by incoming disturbance entering south-west Rajasthan.

The IMD located the slow-moving entourage of the disturbance to over south-east Pakistan and adjoining south-west Rajasthan as it lay spreadeagled across the international border. This is even as a counterpart cyclonic circulation waited over north-west Bay of Bengal to set up an interaction with the disturbance farther to the east and set up anticipated counterpart ‘low.’

Extremely heavy rain

The 24 hours ending on Monday morning saw extremely heavy rain over Madhya Maharashtra; Tamil Nadu, Puducherry and Karaikal; Coastal Karnataka; and Kerala and Mahe. Heavy to very heavy rain lashed hills of West Bengal and Sikkim; Odisha; West Uttar Pradesh; Gujarat; Konkan and Goa; Madhya Maharashtra; and South Interior Karnataka. Heavy pre-monsoon rain was also reported from Arunachal Pradesh, East Uttar Pradesh, Uttarakhand, East Rajasthan and Saurashtra and Kutch.

Deficit a tad lower

This has helped to cut down the rainfall deficit since June 1 to -31 per cent with East and North-East India and North-West India, which account for most of the area not covered by the monsoon, expectedly recording maximum individual deficits of -39 per cent and -38 per cent. The 20-day-hiatus however wiped out early advantage in Centra India (-34 per cent) and South Peninsula (-11 per cent). Both these areas may get spillover gains as monsoon becomes active over East and North-West India.

Published on June 16, 2025