After an early onset of south-west monsoon over Kerala and other parts of south India, conditions are favourable for further advance of monsoon into parts of Maharashtra, more areas of south India and northeast states, India Meteorological Department (IMD) said on Sunday.
The met department stated that monsoon has progressed over parts of Karnataka, Goa, Maharashtra and north-eastern states of Mizoram, Manipur and Nagaland.”Heavy rainfalls is likely to continue over Kerala, Karnataka, coastal Maharashtra and Goa over the next seven days,” IMD said
IMD on Saturday announced the onset of monsoon set over Kerala on Saturday, eight days ahead of the normal date of June 1. This is the earliest date of monsoon onset since 2009 when it entered Kerala on May 23. The earliest onset date this century was May 18, 2004.
IMD in its earlier forecast had said the southwest monsoon is likely to hit Kerala coast on May 27. The forecast of early arrivals of monsoon by the met department had come with a model error of +/- four days.
However, Akshay Deoras, research scientist, National Centre for Atmosphere Science, University of Reading, United Kingdom, said a large amount of dry air from Pakistan and Afghanistan will get pumped towards the Arabian sea and India from May end which may obstruct the progress of the monsoon between May 27 – June 5.
Typically, the monsoon, after onset over Kerala coast in early June, covers the entire country by July. The monsoon rains start gradually receding from the northern region in the middle of September.
Last month, IMD predicted “above normal” monsoon rainfall during June-September this year, with 89% chance of the rains being in the “normal-to excess” range.
The adequate rainfall boosts hopes of robust agriculture-sector output for a second year in a row, as kharif sowing, which starts with the onset of rainfall, accounts for about 60% of the crop production. Monsoon rains also provide soil moisture for the winter crops.
“This year’s rainfall during the forthcoming monsoon season is likely to be 105% of the benchmark long period average (LPA) with an average error margin of +/- 5”, Mrutyunjay Mohapatra, director general, IMD, had said.
Given the forecast of ‘above normal’ monsoon rainfall, the government has set a record target of 354.64 million tonne (MT) for food grains production in the 2025-26 crop year (July-June).