Monsoon rains are likely to pick up in the next 5-6 days in parts of Madhya Pradesh, regional Met officials said Thursday.
?We don?t see heavy rains now but monsoon activity is likely to pick up in the next 5-6 days,? said DP Dubey, director, Regional Met Department, Bhopal.
Monsoon made its entry into the state on Wednesday and is expected to cover the entire state in a few days. Soyabean farmers are awaiting more showers to start sowing. ?Rains have arrived but to start sowing more soil moisture is need,? said Shekhar Thakur, a soyabean farmer from Bhopal.
Farmers have completed tilling of land and soil treatment. They expect to start sowing within a week. Soyabean acreage in the state is unlikely to decline this year as farmers may not switch to other crop.
Meanwhile, the south-west monsoon has further advanced into parts of Orissa, Chhattisgarh and east Madhya Pradesh.
Conditions are favourable for further advance of south-west monsoon into more parts of Orissa, Chhattisgarh, West Bengal, Sikkim, Jharkhand and Bihar during next two to three days, IMD said.
Met department has warned about heavy rainfall over Madhya Maharashtra, Konkan, Goa and coastal Karnataka during the next 48 hours.
Annual monsoon rains were 8% below normal in the week to June 16, said India Meteorological Department on Thursday, reflecting slow progress.
Countrywide rainfall was 32.5mm during the week against a normal 35.2mm, the Met office said, adding the rainfall was at 64.3mm, 5% below normal between June 1 and June 16.
Monsoon made its onset over Kerala on May 31, a day ahead of the mean onset date. IMD, in its first forecast issued in April, said monsoon this year is likely to be ?normal? at 98% of the long-period average. Monsoon is crucial for India?s agriculture, which is largely dependent on rainfall for irrigation.