The weatherman's prediction for a normal monsoon in Bihar this year has been near accurate.

Bihar has recorded 936.8mm rainfall from June 1 to September 30 - 9 per cent less than the normal of 1027.6mm. The Met department calculates monsoon rainfall in this period, and had in its long-range forecast predicted a 96 per cent rainfall for Bihar with a possible departure of eight per cent.

In meteorological parlance, a departure of 19 per cent is considered normal.

According to the Met department's standards, 21 distrcts, including Gopalganj, Darbhanga and Banka, received normal rainfall - departure was 19 per cent more or less than normal; 16 districts including Patna less than normal rainfall and only West Champaran district received more than normal rainfall. 

A majority of the 38 districts getting normal rainfall has also brought bounty on the field, as reflected in the sowing of major kharif crops such as paddy and maize.

According to the figures collected by the agriculture department, paddy has been sown in an area of 3.41 million hectares which is more than the area that was under paddy cultivation last year. In 2016, paddy had been sown over an area of 3.29 million hectares.

The area of maize cultivation has, however, come down marginally this year - from 432,340 hectares in 2016, maize was sowed on 409,561 hectares this year.

'Maize is cultivated in area spread over the eastern districts. As flash floods hit these areas this year, the total sown area has come down,' said an agriculture department official on the marginal drop.

So far as monsoon withdrawal from Bihar is concerned, it is likely to start after October 10.

'Several places in east Bihar, including Katihar, Bhagalpur, Supaul and Purnea, are likely to receive good rainfall on Monday whereas scattered rainfall is likely across the state in next five days,' Patna Met office scientist Anand Shankar told The Telegraph on Monday.

Rainfall is likely the next five days because the monsoon trough line was extending from East Bihar to Chhattisgarh, Shankar said, for which rain and thunderstorm is likely.

Shankar also maintained that a new system was likely to develop over Bihar on October 8, leading to some more rainfall in several parts of the state. 'Going by the existing conditions and the likely weather in the coming few days, we expect monsoon to start withdrawing from Bihar between October 10 and 15,' he said.

Monsoon withdrawal starts from western parts of the state, weathermen said, and takes something between two to seven days to complete.