Mixed picture in this week's rainfall

Country's cumulative seasonal rainfall about 1% less than long-period average

The southwest monsoon, lifeline of tens of millions of farmers across India, was just a little below normal during the week ended yesterday, the India Meteorological Department (IMD) said on Friday.

The cumulative seasonal rainfall for the country as a whole was about one per cent less than the long-period average, it said. In 2012, rainfall during the first week of the season was 30 per cent below normal.

Of the country's 36 meteorological segments, it has been excess in 15 and normal in another six. it has been deficient or scanty over the other 15. The rains, which entered the country through the Kerala coast on last Saturday, was 62 per cent above normal in the southern peninsula (Kerala, Tamil Nadu, Karnataka and Andhra Pradesh), three per cent below normal in central India (Madhya Pradesh, Maharashtra and Gujarat), and 19 per cent below normal in northwest India (Delhi, Punjab, Haryana and Rajasthan). And, 36 per cent below normal in the east and northeast.IMD said conditions were favourable for further advance of the monsoon over the east and northeast, south Madhya Pradesh, Jharkhand, Bihar and the remaining parts of Odisha during the second half of the week ending June 14.