Trend shows dip in rains in 5 states: Centre to Lok Sabha
Uttar Pradesh, Bihar, West Bengal, Meghalaya and Nagaland have been seeing a reduction in south-west monsoon rainfall over the past 30 years, earth sciences minister Kiren Rijiju said in a reply to a question in Parliament
New Delhi:

Uttar Pradesh, Bihar, West Bengal, Meghalaya and Nagaland have been seeing a reduction in south-west monsoon rainfall over the past 30 years, earth sciences minister Kiren Rijiju said in a reply to a question in Parliament.
Responding to a question in Lok Sabha on the changing rainfall patterns in India on Wednesday, Rijiju said data from India Meteorological Department between 1989 and 2020 show that the five states have been recording a decreasing trend of monsoon rainfall between June and September.
Arunachal Pradesh and Himachal Pradesh, too, also recently joined these states in recording lower rainfall during the south-west monsoon, the minister said.
“Associated with the climate change due to global warming, temporal and spatial diversity in severe weathers including extremely heavy rainfall have been observed in the country in the recent years in line with increase in the extreme events observed over various other parts of the globe,” Rijiju said.
While some states are seeing a trend of reduced rainfall, there are others, Saurashtra and Kutch, south-eastern Rajasthan, northern Tamil Nadu, northern Andhra Pradesh and adjoining areas of south-western Odisha, many parts of Chhattisgarh, south-western Madhya Pradesh, West Bengal, Manipur, Mizoram, Konkan, Goa and Uttarakhand have seen an increase in the frequency of heavy rainfall days.
The weather bureau is closely analysing this trend of changing rainfall patterns across the country, director general M Mohapatra said. “We are witnessing some alterations in monsoon patterns, including onset dates, coverage and monsoon behaviour in various parts of the country,” he said. “We are closely monitoring these trends and adapting our systems to accommodate these changes to ensure forecasts and warnings are accurate.”
One sign of the 2023 monsoon season being erratic is that rain of heavy and extreme intensity has a much smaller deficit than overall rain, HT’s analysis of official rainfall data showed. According to Met department’s gridded data set, overall rain has a deficit of 17.1% up to 8:30am on June 26, while heavy and extreme rain combined has a deficit of just 6.9% compared to the 1961-2010 average, the benchmark for rain. While overall rain is ranked 95th highest (or 29th lowest) since 1901, heavy and extreme rain is ranked 68th highest (or 56th lowest).
To be sure, the smaller deficit in heavy and extreme rain is despite the fact that 64% of the country has not received rain of such intensity at all, whereas only 0.1% of India’s total area is yet to receive any rain in June.
Long-term data on India’s June-September monsoon season show the share of heavy and extreme rain in total monsoon rain has been increasing consistently since the 1970s. The share of such rain in the 2011-20 decade (43.32%) was the highest among all 12 decades starting from 1901-10. In the 2013-22 decade, the share of such rain further increased to 43.39%.
