Top Indian cities brace for a wet weekend after Met Dept forecast two weeks of 'above average' rain

• Monsoon is expected to bring above-average rain showers in the coming two weeks, according to weather officials.
  
• The weekend — 27-28 July — will receive heavy rainfall in states of Maharashtra, Delhi, West Bengal and Uttarakhand among others.
  
• Last week, India witnessed low rainfall, 35% below average.
  
• The monsoon rainfall accounts for 70% of India’s annual rainfall.

Monsoons have started late across the country, but looks like they will have an extended run. In the coming two weeks, monsoons are expected to bring in the much needed showers, according to weather officials.

“In the next two weeks, we are likely to get above average rainfall, which will be well distributed across the country,” said A K Srivastava, head of the climate research division, India Meteorological Department (IMD) told Reuters.

Rainy weekend

The weekend — 27 to 28 July — will receive heavy rainfall in states of Rajasthan, coastal Maharashtra, Goa, Uttarakhand, Haryana, Delhi, Madhya Pradesh, West Bengal, interior Maharashtra and Odisha.


Other states with high rainfall and thunderstorms include coastal Karnataka, Andhra Pradesh, Chhattisgarh, Uttar Pradesh, Jammu & Kashmir, Himachal Pradesh, Punjab, Assam, Meghalaya, Gujarat and Jharkhand.

However, in the national capital Delhi, rains will come with bad air quality, the weather report said.

The IMD weather forecast aligns with predictions of the Climate Prediction Centre of the US National Weather Service, which too had predicted monsoon showers between 1-8 August.

Drought & Floods

This year India had faced extreme weather conditions — floods and droughts. While Chennai is battling water crisis, Assam is struggling with floods.

Overall, the monsoon was deficient by 17% which impacted the crops. The most affected are cotton and groundnut crops in Gujarat. This late monsoons will bring cheer to Indian farmers and yield summer-sown crops, which have been sagging due to low rainfall.

“Good rainfall in the next few days can bring down stress level and accelerate sowing,” said Prerana Desai, Head of Research at Edelweiss Rural & Corporate Services.

Over half of the arable land banks on monsoon rains for cultivation as they account for 70% of India’s total rainfall. According to the Agriculture Ministry, crop plantation has been low with summer crop plantation spreading over 56.7 million hectares of land this year.

See also:
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Chennai gets monsoon showers, but its too little to solve the water crisis