Monsoon needs a ‘push’ to keep its date with Delhi
The southwest monsoon is trying hard to keep its date with the country’s capital.
While it has already failed to meet deadlines with some states in western and eastern India, officials of the meteorological department are hopeful that this week would be a ‘good one’ for the winds that help to advance the monsoon.
“Monsoon is advancing steadily. This week will be very good for the advancement of monsoon across some states in western and eastern India. On Monday, it reached both Mumbai and Kolkata,” said a senior official of the Indian Meteorological Department.
But if one goes by the scheduled dates of arrival of the monsoon then it has fallen short in meeting the deadlines in some states.
“Going by the usual onset dates, the monsoon should have covered almost the entire Maharashtra, Telangana, Andhra Pradesh, parts of Odisha and West Bengal by June 10,” said an official.
But while it arrived in Kolkata at least four days late, in Mumbai it was behind schedule by two days.
“Officially, it can’t be said that the monsoon is delayed. A monsoon can be declared delayed only if it fails to make its onset even after seven days of the scheduled date of arrival. We can now say it is near normal,” said the official.
... The monsoon will need a push to keep its date with Delhi and other states in northwest.
The question that is now making the rounds is whether the monsoon will hit Delhi on time or would it get delayed. The scheduled date of arrival for Delhi is June 29.
“It is too early to predict. We can only predict that once it covers the west and central states. But the monsoon will need a push to keep its date with Delhi and other states in north-west India,” he added.
Experts said that systems such as a low pressure or a depression over the Bay of Bengal would help the monsoon to advance further over the eastern states.
“The advancing monsoon winds had slowed down over the past two to three days. But then it got a push because of a depression over the Bay of Bengal and advanced significantly over Maharashtra and West Bengal on Monday,” said the official.
If similar low pressures or depressions form over the Arabian Sea and it advances towards the Indian coast, instead of moving towards Oman, then it would help to drag the monsoon towards Delhi. Similar conditions were seen in 2013.
Last week the IMD had predicted that rainfall over the country as a whole for the 2017 southwest monsoon season (June to September) will most likely be normal (96%-104%).
North-west India, which includes Delhi and NCR, would receive around 96% rain.
Five days after a 20-year-old BA second-year student was attacked allegedly by four youths for taking on the stalker of his sister, the Delhi Police have arrested two of them from south Delhi’s Govindpuri area, police said on Monday.
One of the arrested youth, Afzal alias Moin, 22, is alleged to be the one who had been stalking and harassing the woman for the past one-and-half years. He was threatened to kill her and her family if she married anyone else, police said.
Moin has told police he was in a relationship with the woman. However, she had started ignoring him of late and this enraged him, police said. The other arrested accused was identified as Rahees alias Imran, 21. Two more suspects, who have been identified, are evading arrest.
A senior police officer said the crime took place on Wednesday night at the victim family’s home in south Delhi’s Govindpuri. Around 11 pm, the man was sleeping in his second-floor room when he heard somebody calling out his sister’s name. His sister was sleeping in another room.
“When I came out, I saw two of my neighbours on the terrace with two of their friends. They were all drunk,” said the man.
Hearing the commotion, the man’s mother came out and asked the four to leave. The four started abusing her. This enraged her son. A scuffle broke out during which the accused allegedly took out a knife and attacked him.