Monsoon picks up, more rains likely this week

4% Above Normal In Last 7 Days New Delhi: The feel-good sentiment that you may have experienced over the past 10 days or so with frequent rain is for real. After playing truant for most of the season, shortly before it exits from the country, the monsoon has picked up pace. In the past week it was actually 4% in excess of normal.      The spurt in rainfall, which is likely to sustain over the next seven days, was triggered by the Madden-Julian oscillation, an equatorial weather system, towards the end of August. But the phenomenon's "success'' in inducing rainfall has depended on supportive monsoon conditions over the mainland, including local factors.      Met officials are now optimistic that the coming week is also likely to witness good rain over several parts of the country. A strong system in the Bay of Bengal is likely to bring rain in Chhattisgarh and Madhya Pradesh to start with and, later in the week, cause showers in Delhi, Haryana, Punjab and Rajasthan.      The Met says there is no immediate sign of the withdrawal of monsoon though the deficit, which has built up since June,is still likely to be more than the long-term average predictions made at the onset of rains.      As per the latest data, deficiency in the monsoon over the country is 21%, an improvement from the -25% two weeks back and -29% in early August. Of the 36 meteorological subdivisions in the country, 14 recorded normal to excess rain while the rest had deficient rain—between minus 20% and minus 59%—in the past week.  It's raining good news for the city      Mumbai can expect heavy showers over the next two days, according to the weather bureau. The total rainfall this season is 1,575 mm in Colaba and 1,890 mm in Santa Cruz. With lakes like Upper Vaitarna, Tulsi, Tansa, Modak Sagar and Vihar close to the brim, BMC officials said that if the rains continued, the 15% water cuts could eventually be cut to negligible levels. P 2 Showers this week could cut rainfall deficit further  New Delhi: With the monsoon showing signs of a revival, even the region comprising Haryana, Punjab and Delhi, which till September 2 had consistently experienced scanty rainfall—between—60% and 99%—saw an improvement. Delhi's rainfall deficiency decreased slightly, now down to 20% compared to 23% at the beginning of the month after receiving 43.6 mm rainfall in this period.      South and central India, which have been getting normal or excess rain in almost all parts since last week, have significantly improved their monsoon deficiency which decreased from 14% to 8% and from 20% to 15% respectively over the past two weeks.      The forecast for the coming week, say experts, is expected to bridge this gap further though there doesn't seem to be much hope of a "proper revival'' so late in the day, specially in northwest India which has been worst-hit this year. "A strong system has formed as a deep depression over Bay of Bengal that is slowly moving westwards. It is nearly over Jharkhand and then is likely to move over northern Chhattisgarh and MP. The monsoon is therefore very active over east and central India at present and is likely to remain so for the next 4-5 days. The west coast is also getting significantly good rain,'' said B P Yadav, director, IMD.      The system will start affecting northwest India in another couple of days and eastern UP and Uttarakhand will get good rainfall from Sunday or Monday. Eventually, as the system progresses, plains of northwest India will also benefit and till about Thursday,the region, including Haryana, Punjab and UP will see an active monsoon. Yadav said, "As of now, there are no signs of the monsoon system withdrawing from any part of the country.''  'Sept rains key to sustain 6.3% growth'  Pune: Planning Commission member Narendra Jadhav said on Sunday that the rainfall in September will be critical to stabilising India's economic growth rate at 6.3% for 2009-10. "If it doesn't rain in September, the growth rate may fall below 6%, but even in the worst- case scenario, it will not go below 5.5%,'' he said. Jadhav said the Planning Commission was anticipating the average growth for the five-year term ending 2012, to be at 6.8%. This, considering that the growth rate will pick up to 8% by 2010-11 and to 9% by 2011-12. Jadhav said the effect of drought would "minimise'' only if there is good rainfall in the month of September. TNN