New Delhi: As India marks the official end of Southwest Monsoon today, it is left with a -12 per cent rain shortfall after a third of its territory witnessed deficient precipitation during the wet season.
The official period for the Southwest Monsoon season in India is between June 1 and Sept. 30.
According to the Indian Meteorological Department (IMD), monsoon is fast winding up and its withdrawal line passes through Jammu, Una, Bareilly, Kanpur, Nowgong, Ujjain, Vadodara and Porbandar. It is also active over Kerala, IMD said.
Private forecasting agency Skymet said that only one sub- division, South Interior Karnataka, received excess rainfall, of 21 per cent, while about 30 per cent of the country received deficient rainfall.
The overall monsoon deficit in the country was at -12 per cent this year, as per IMD data.
IMD had projected a "below normal" monsoon this year for India and the country received 775-mm rainfall as against the normal precipitation of 883-mm.
The onset of monsoon was weak with June seeing a high rainfall deficit of -43 per cent.
However, conditions improved in July and August on the back of good spells of rain in their last two weeks. The good rainfall in July, August and September helped limit the overall deficit to -12 per cent.
Northwest division, which includes eastern and western Uttar Pradesh, Delhi, Chandigarh and Haryana saw a rain deficit of -21 per cent, the highest in the country, while the shortfall for the southern peninsula was -7 per cent.
Good rainfall in the last three months kept the overall deficit at -9 per cent in Central India while eastern and Northeast India recorded a deficit of -12 per cent.
According to IMD, overall, Sept. 4 recorded the highest rainfall for a single day while June 1, the date for the official onset of the monsoon in the country, recorded the least rainfall for one day.
