GROUND REALITY

Move over drought, Met office predicts normal monsoon this yr

New Delhi: The country will receive normal rainfall this season, the weather office announced on Friday much to the relief of millions of farmers who faced the brunt of a drought last year.
    Rainfall during the June-September southwest monsoon season is expected to be 98% of the Long Period Average (LPA), the Met department said. The southwest monsoon’s LPA averaged over the country as a whole is 89 cm. It is the mean of rainfall between 1941 and 1990. The forecast has a model error of 5%.
    The forecast for better rains this season comes after India witnessed one of the worst droughts in recent times when the monsoon had failed last year. A normal m o n s o o n is necessary to power the Indian economy as over 235 million people depend on agriculture. Last month, the World Meteorological Organisation said El Nino had peaked, but was expected to impact climate patterns up to mid-year before dying out. AGENCIES