Finally some good news on the weather front as the country’s southwest monsoon has started picking up pace, narrowing the deficit.
As per the India Meteorological Department, the cumulative rainfall for the entire 2009 season, from June 1 to July 22, is now estimated to be 19% deficient. Till last week the deficiency was around 27%.
On a week-on-week basis, the rainfall is plus 43% across the country, in other words, there has been substantial improvement in monsoon since last week, with large parts of northern, central and western India receiving good showers.
Of the 36 meteorological sub-divisions in the country, till July 22, almost 17 had received excess or normal rain, while 19 got scanty or deficient rain. Last week, the number of sub-divisions receiving deficient rain were more than 25.
However, northwestern parts of the country, comprising of main foodgrain, coarse cereals and sugarcane growing states of Punjab, Haryana, western Uttar Pradesh, Himachal Pradesh has still not managed to get around half of their average quota of rains.
In Punjab, the southwest monsoon is still around 49% deficient for the week ending July 22, though it has come down from around 60% last week. In Haryana, the rains are still around 60% deficient, while in west and east Uttar Pradesh, the monsoon showers are around 58% deficient. In Bihar, the southwest monsoon is still around 64% deficient.
The big improvement has been in Madhya Pradesh and Gujarat, where the deficiency has narrowed to between 7% to 13% and 22% respectively, from more than 30% till last week.
In the southern parts of the country, all regions except Rayalseema and some parts of Tamil Nadu has received more rains than normal.
The improvement in monsoon showers has also pushed up the storage level in 81 major reservoirs across the country, vital for irrigation and power generation.