6% more rainfall than normal so far

The country has received six per cent more rainfall than normal so far in this monsoon season, but precipitation in parts of north India remains deficient, the India Meteorological Department (IMD) said on Sunday.

The IMD has four meteorological divisions and rainfall has been more than normal in the south peninsula, central India, and east and northeast India divisions.

But the northwest India division, which covers Jammu and Kashmir, Ladakh, Uttarakhand, Himachal Pradesh, Uttar Pradesh, Haryana, Punjab, Delhi and Rajasthan, has recorded a 19 per cent deficiency, according to the IMD.

Till Sunday, rainfall deficiency was recorded in Himachal Pradesh, Rajasthan, Jammu and Kashmir. Ladakh has recorded large scale deficiency, it said.

Monsoon arrived in Kerala on June 1, its normal onset date, marking the commencement of the fourmonth rainfall season in the country. India is likely to get normal monsoon, according to the IMD’S forecast.

In its long range forecast update for Monsoon 2020 released in June, the IMD had predicted 107 per cent of rainfall of the Long Period Average (LPA) for northwest India which comes under the ‘above normal’ category.