Patna, Sept. 20: Heavy rainfall over the last one week has significantly improved the monsoon scenario in Bihar, reducing the deficiency from 31 per cent to 16 per cent.
Over the past week, the state got 179mm rainfall.
Ashish Sen, director (radar), India Meteorological Department, Patna, told The Telegraph on Thursday: “The past spell of rainfall —that stretched from Thursday last week to Tuesday this week — was caused by a favourable position of the monsoon trough line accompanied by a prolonged cyclonic circulation over Jharkhand and its neighbouring areas.”
He added: “The cumulative rainfall figure for the entire state stood at 631mm on Thursday, when the rain started. The downpour continued for the next five days, which proved beneficial in bringing down the rainfall deficiency. As a result, the cumulative rainfall figure for the entire state has soared to 810mm today, which is 16 per cent deficient than the normal rainfall.”
The normal rainfall till now should have been 966mm. Sources said the IMD considers departure of 19 per cent as regular.
However, the IMD has forecast weak monsoon over the state for the next two days. “Monsoon would be weak in the state during next 48 hours. The next spell of good rainfall in the state is expected only after September 23,” said Sen.
IMD has also claimed the withdrawal of the southwest monsoon from the country has been delayed by 20 days. The rains are not expected to withdraw from the western parts of the country for the next seven days either.
“The withdrawal of southwest monsoon usually starts in Rajasthan on September 1. This year, it has not started till now. However, the delay in withdrawal of monsoon from the northwestern parts of the country is not very important. The withdrawal from western Uttar Pradesh on October 1 is important for the whole country,” said Sen.
Last year, too, there was a similar delay in the withdrawal of the southwest monsoon from Rajasthan. It began to retreat from on September 23. Despite the delay, the retreat from western Uttar Pradesh was almost normal and started on October 1. “There has been a delay in the retreat of monsoon from the western parts of the country. However, that does not indicate anything about Bihar,” said Sen.
