New Delhi, June 13
Early indications have now been received of revival of the monsoon current from the Arabian Sea side from June 19 onwards. With this, the National Centre for Medium Range Forecast (NCMRF) hopes that fresh rain activity will begin around June 19 over Kerala and coastal Karnataka that will gradually spread northward over Peninsular India.
The flip side, however, is that since the monsoon will revive from the Arabian Sea side, the current may now travel in phases and take longer time than expected to reach Central and northwest India. Weather experts said had the monsoon build-up taken place from the Bay of Bengal side, the current would have covered the country faster.
Considering that the monsoon is expected to remain in a low phase till June 17 and revive from the Arabian Sea side, the NCMRF has advised farmers in rain-fed and partially-irrigated areas, or where the monsoon has already arrived but been deficient, to defer sowing of kharif crops till the situation improves.
While farmers in areas that have received deficient to scanty rains so far have been advised to wait till the situation improves, for farmers in Central India the advice is to only prepare the fields for sowing paddy nursery and other kharif crops as dry weather conditions are expected during this week.
However, farmers of irrigated states like Jammu and Kashmir, Himachal Pradesh, Uttaranchal, Punjab and Delhi can go ahead with transplantation of paddy nurseries by selecting varieties like K39, Palam Dhan, Pant Dhan-12, PR-108 and Pusa Basmati-1.
Experts feel that since these states have assured irrigation conditions, farmers in these states can go ahead with their job as by the time the crop will require natural rain, the monsoon will hopefully set in.
As of now, the southwest monsoon continues to be in a weak phase since June 8 and the NCMRF consensus forecast, based on various model products, indicate low probability of revival of monsoon during the next five days and continuance of weak monsoon phase conditions till June 18.
The Arabian Sea current had weakened as early as on June 4 and since the beginning of the weak monsoon phase, there had been subdued rain activity over most parts of the country, except northeastern states where fairly widespread rains with isolated heavy falls are taking place.
As per the NCMRF, prevailing western disturbance over Jammu and Kashmir is expected to remain near stationary for some time and under its influence isolated rain and snow may continue over hilly
regions of northwest India during next 48 hours.Another western disturbance is likely to affect northwest India between June 16 and 18, causing fairly widespread rain and snow over the hilly region and scattered rain activity over adjoining plains of Punjab and Haryana, including Delhi, on June 16 and 17.
At present, persistent dry weather conditions have resulted in day temperatures over plains of northwest India and adjoining parts of eastern and Central India to hover between 40 and 44ºC. Predictions indicate the possibility of development of heat waves in some of these areas.
The eastern parts, like Bihar, Jharkhand, Orissa and West Bengal, may also experience rise in temperatures during the next two to three days.
