JOIN USMonsoon withdrawal begins three weeks after usual period
The Indian summer monsoon on Wednesday began to retreat from the northwest parts of the country three weeks after its regular withdrawal date of September 17, marking the second-most delayed withdrawal of the southwest monsoon in the last 60 years.
The record of the most delayed withdrawal will go to 2019 when the monsoon’s return journey started on October 9. According to the India Meteorological Department, 2019 and 2021 are the only two years since 1961 when monsoon withdrawal commenced in October.
However, down south Karnataka and other states are likely to experience heavy to moderate rainfall in the next couple of days due to a cyclonic conditions off Tamil Nadu impacting local weather.
“As a consequence, isolated heavy rainfall is very likely over Kerala and coastal Karnataka between October 6-10; over Tamil Nadu between Oct 6-7 and over interior Karnataka between Oct 6-8,” India Meteorological Department says in a statement.
After a bountiful September that witnessed the last 28 years’ second-highest rainfall, the 2021 south west monsoon began withdrawing from parts of northwest India and would be gone from Rajasthan, Gujarat, Punjab, Haryana, Jammu and Kashmir, Himachal Pradesh, Delhi, Uttarakhand and parts of Uttar Pradesh and Madhya Pradesh over the next three-four days.
“This is the second most delayed withdrawal in the last 60 years after 1961, which recorded withdrawal on Oct 1,” said an IMD scientist.
Thanks to the late surge in rainfall, this year India recorded a normal monsoon for the season even after registering a decline in July and a sharp drop in August when the country as a whole saw a 24 per cent drop in monsoon with the highest fall being recorded in central (39 per cent) and northwest India (31 per cent).
Both zones were compensated in September when central India received 85 per cent excess rainfall and the northwest got 40 per cent more. Out of the 13 low pressure systems created in the Bay of Bengal and the Arabian Sea between June and September, as many as five happened in September. The month also experienced a cyclone and a deep depression.
As a result, Delhi recorded 413 mm of rainfall in September – the second highest in the last 121 years after 1944 (417.3 mm).
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