Curtains on southwest monsoon with excess rains in Rajasthan, deficit in northeast

The southwest monsoon season comes to an end on Friday with the country receiving seven per cent excess showers, but the rice-growing states of Uttar Pradesh, Bihar, Jharkhand reported deficient rains having a direct impact on the farm output.

Though the country as a whole has received excess rainfall, the distribution has been uneven with the desert state of Rajasthan reporting 36 per cent more rains than normal and the northeast region, which witnesses copious showers, receiving deficit rainfall.

Also Read: Monsoon has withdrawn from Delhi: IMD

Tamil Nadu, which usually receives rains during the north-east monsoon season beginning October, received 477.3 mm rainfall, which was 47 per cent excess of the normal of 323.6 mm for the south-west monsoon season.

According to the India Meteorological Department (IMD), the southwest monsoon season begins on June 1 and ends on September 30. The rainfall during October is recorded as post-monsoon rains.

The southwest monsoon entered the withdrawal phase on September 20 and as of Thursday has retreated entirely from Punjab, Chandigarh and Delhi, some parts of Jammu and Kashmir, Himachal Pradesh, Haryana, Rajasthan and Gujarat, the weather office said.

According to data shared by the IMD, Manipur received 543.2 mm rains between June 1 and September 29, which was 47 per cent less than the long period average of 1,033 mm for the season.

Tripura (1,056.7 mm actual rain) and Mizoram (1,264.1 mm) reported deficits of 24 per cent and 22 per cent respectively, the weather office said.

Also Read: Rains affect 1.35 lakh hectares of farm area in Punjab

In Arunachal Pradesh (1430.1 mm), the deficit was 14 per cent, while Nagaland (901.4 mm) received rainfall of 13 per cent less than normal, Assam (1340.5 mm) nine per cent less than normal and Meghalaya (2,474.5 mm) 8 per cent less than normal.

Since the weather office considers up to 20 per cent deficient rains as normal, these states do not fall under the category of rain deficit states.

West Bengal, the top rice producing state in the country, saw 17 per cent deficient rains, directly impacting paddy sowing in the state. The area where paddy has been sown in West Bengal was 38.52 lakh hectares, 3.65 lakh hectares less than the 42.7 lakh hectares under paddy cultivation last kharif season.

Overall, farmers have planted 401.56 lakh hectares this season, 23.44 lakh hectares less than the previous crop season.

Telangana reported 46 per cent excess rainfall during the season, followed by Karnataka (29 per cent), Gujarat (28 per cent), Madhya Pradesh (24 per cent) and Maharashtra (23 per cent).