Our predictions are more accurate than IMD's: Mahesh Palawat

Interview with chief meteorologist, Skymet

The Met department and private forecaster Skymet have been at loggerheads in several occasions in their monsoon forecasts. Mahesh Palawat, chief meteorologist of Skymet tells Somesh Jha that they are not competing with IMD and that despite IMD being more equipped than them, the private forecaster comes out with more accurate predictions.

 

In an interview, IMD told us that Skymet is misguiding the stakeholders with its predictions...

Each organisation is doing its own job and predicting the monsoon as per its capacity and parameters.

If there are three forecasters in the market, their forecasts will differ in some way or the other.

Are your weather forecasts more accurate than IMD’s?

We had predicted this year’s long period average (LPA) rainfall would be 103 per cent and till September 30, the country received 106 per cent LPA. Hence, our prediction was almost accurate. However, we are not competing with IMD; both organisations work on separate lines and catering to national needs.

Do you mean you are better equipped than IMD?

No, the Met department is better equipped than us. But we have 14-15 forecasters with experience of 35 years or more, who come up with their own analysis. However, IMD has more manpower than us.

Still you say you are able to predict more precisely than IMD?

We have 1,500 weather stations in the country and we give LPA to our clients and if that goes wrong, we will lose them. That there are still so many clients associated with us shows our predictions are correct. Else, we would have not survived.

You are in the market only for private players, right?

We are business-oriented and IMD serves nationally. But we have a record of 80 per cent prediction accuracy to our clients and are constantly improving over the years.

During the recent Cyclone Phailin, IMD's assessment was correct on almost all parameters. Why didn't Skymet come out with such a forecast?

Our forecast for Phailin was  on the same lines. On various television news channels, we had given our analysis, but as IMD is widely accepted, more importance was given to it. Our forecast was spot on, too.

Does that mean there is no question of misguiding as IMD alleges?

Why would we misguide? We are doing our business and are not misleading anybody. Also, as I said, we are not competing with IMD but we are serving our clients.