The monsoon deficit has come down to 31 per cent with rains picking up in July across the country, giving relief to farmers, the weather office said on Sunday.
“The monsoon deficit has come down by 12 per cent (in July) and the overall deficit stands at around 31 per cent. This will bring in much needed relief to the farmers and solve the water issues,” said Laxman Singh Rathore, Director-General of the India Meteorological Department. The monsoon covered the entire country on July 17.
Central and northwestern India have been receiving deficient rainfall, but even in these parts the monsoon has been making progress, IMD said.
Meanwhile, Jitendra Singh, Minister of State for Earth Sciences, took a stock of the situation along with the Ministry’s secretary Shailesh Nayak.
The monsoon is expected to remain good for the next two weeks in north, central, southern peninsula and eastern India, Mr. Rathore said.
However, parts of northwestern India, which includes western Rajasthan and Kutch region, may still receive weak rainfall.
The cyclonic circulation developing over northeastern Bay of Bengal is likely to become a low pressure area within 24 hours, forecasting firm Skymet said.
In the next 24 to 48 hours, the weather system will bring in widespread good monsoon rains over Telangana, Chhattisgarh, east Madhya Pradesh and Vidarbha, it said.
The rain belt will gradually shift to bring rest of Madhya Pradesh and adjoining Maharashtra under its purview. By July 22-23, a fresh weather system will bring rains over Gangetic West Bengal, Bihar, Jharkhand and Odisha, it said.
The entire west coast, particularly Konkan and Gujarat, would also receive good rainfall as the monsoon trough was running from Gujarat coast to Kerala coast, it added.
