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Weathermen confident of revival of rain

Surinder Sud in New Delhi

Even as disquiet over delay in the arrival of the monsoon in the northern states and deficient precipitation in pockets elsewhere continues to grow, the India Meteorological Department seemed confident about an early revival of rains.

A spokesperson of the IMD said that the low pressure area formed over north-west Bay of Bengal-Orissa coast was a "significant development" that would have a positive impact on the revival of the monsoon.

The seasonal troughs (low pressure areas) which activate the monsoon were also becoming pronounced, indicating strengthening of the monsoon activity.

"These developments raise hopes not only for the further advance of the monsoon to the northern areas left uncovered by it so far, but also for the revival of rainfall in other parts of the country as well," he said.

Agriculture experts are, however, keeping their fingers crossed. Though the actual damage to the crops, which have already been planted, is still localised, it might become irretrievable if it does not rain for another four-five days.

The delay in the arrival of the monsoon in northern states might also necessitate contingent planning for switching over to either shorter duration varieties or alternative crops that require less time to grow.

According to available information, only 16 of the country's total 36 meteorological sub-divisions have received normal or above-normal rainfall. These include the states of West Bengal, Bihar, Jharkhand, Maharashtra, Gujarat and Goa.

The areas which are yet to be covered by the monsoon include parts of Haryana, Punjab, Uttar Pradesh, Rajasthan, Madhya Pradesh and Delhi. The rest of the states have recorded lower than the long-period average rainfall so far.

The silver lining in this situation is that the shortfall of precipitation in most of the 20 deficient sub-divisions is only from meteorological point of view. From agricultural angle, the water that has already been added to the soil by the earlier rainy spell is deemed adequate to support the crops.

In the northern scanty-rainfall belt, the crop situation is reported to be normal in the agriculturally important region of Punjab, Haryana and western Uttar Pradesh, as well as in other areas where sufficient irrigation water is available. Paddy, the main cereal crop of this season, has already been transplanted in these tracts.

However, the main concern is about the unirrigated areas in Uttar Pradesh, Madhya Pradesh and Rajasthan. "We will have to change our crop production strategies for these areas to mitigate the impact of the paucity of rains," said Mangala Rai, deputy director-general (crop sciences) of the Indian Council of Agricultural Research.

He said since the time available for crop growth would be short in the areas that have not received rains as yet, the farmers should be advised to go in for quicker maturing crop varieties. "If this is not done, the crop yield might remain low," Rai said.

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