The city witnessed light rainfall on Wednesday but weathermen have said that rain would continue to play truant in Patna and several districts in central and south Bihar.

These parts have been receiving scanty rainfall over the past four to five days despite favourable weather conditions, including position of the trough line. But they would hardly get rainfall in the next three or four days.

Weathermen are now more concerned as the trough line will shift to an unfavourable position in south and central Bihar, including Patna, over the next couple of days.

Moreover, a low-pressure area over Odisha is also obstructing the flow of moisture towards the rain deficient districts of the state.

“The favourable position of the trough line is Uttar Pradesh-Jharkhand-Bihar-Gangetic Bengal-Bay of Bengal. However, it is passing through Rajasthan-Delhi- Uttar Pradesh-Chhattisgarh-Odisha-Bay of Bengal. Apart from that, a low-pressure area has also formed over Odisha today (Wednesday), which would obstruct the flow of moisture towards Bihar over the next couple of days,” said Ashish Sen, director, India Meteorological Department (IMD), Patna.

The light rain in Patna gave respite to the residents from the heat and humidity.

“The rain came as a great relief from the sultry conditions that had gripped the city in the past couple of days. As it hasn’t rained heavily here even once this year, I hope that there would be more rain in the coming days so that people can enjoy good weather conditions,” said Riya Upadhyay, a resident of Patliputra.

The rain has been concentrated in districts in north-east and north-west Bihar in the past couple of days and rainfall at most places in south and central Bihar has been scanty.

Thirteen districts, mostly in these areas, are facing drought-like situation at present .

The monsoon bulletin of the IMD on Wednesday stated that rain or thundershowers was expected at many places in Bihar during the next three days.

The local met department, however, claimed that heavy rain would be concentrated in north Bihar only.

“Based on the present weather conditions, south and central Bihar is likely to receive only light rainfall at isolated places over the next 72 hours. North Bihar would continue to get heavy rainfall during the same time. Though the low-pressure area over Odisha is expected to move towards Chhattisgarh after 72 hours, we cannot say anything about rain thereafter in south and central Bihar owing to unfavourable position of the trough line,” said Sen.

As of July 9, Bihar had received 271mm rainfall since June 1 against the normal rainfall of 278mm expected during this period, leaving a deficiency of three per cent. Patna, on the other hand, received 161mm rainfall between June 1 and July 9 against the normal 228mm, leaving a whopping deficiency of 29 per cent.