
The data from India Meteorological Department showed that the monsoon for the season was 7 percent deficient between June 1 and July 10.
For the first time this year on July 10, the summer-sown crops had been hit by patchy rains in many parts of the country as the southwest monsoon showed a seasonal deficit of more than 5 percent.
It had been by the forecasters that the rain-bearing system should be reactivated soon.
The Agriculture Ministry showed data that mentioned that the total acreage of Kharid crops was at 49 million hectares which were almost 11 percent less than the 55 million hectares which were sown in the previous year.
The monsoon was critical for Asia’s third-largest economy as nearly half of the country’s population depended on it and 60 percent of the country’s net sown area did not have irrigation access. The rains had also replenished more than 100 national important reservoirs, critical for drinking water and irrigation.
The millions of farmers depended on the rains to sow a range of summer crops, and as of July 10, 2021, the area under rice stood at 11 million hectares compared to a normal area of 11.6 million hectares.
The total sown area was 21 percent lower on June 25.
The IMD had forecasted saying that monsoon should start by mid-July. In their latest bulletin, it had said that the monthly rainfall for July 2021 over the country as a whole was most likely to be normal.
As per the sources, the Meteorological subdivisions such as east Madhya Pradesh, Punjab, east Rajasthan, west Rajasthan, parts of Gujarat region, Saurashtra, Kutch, Vidarbha, Madhya Maharashtra, Chhattisgarh, coastal Karnataka, and south interior Karnataka received lower than average precipitation.
Jeet Singh Sandhu, the vice-chancellor of the SKN Agricultural University, Jaipur, said that the July rainfalls were the most critical during the four-month Kharif season and that there would be an impact in sowing in the areas where the irrigation was not available.
Till Friday, the actual cumulative monsoon rainfall that had been received in the country was 223 mm against the normal rainfall received between June 1 and July 9, i.e, 234.5.
The Agriculture Ministry official said that sowing was less than normal in Maharashtra, Gujarat, Rajasthan, Haryana, and Punjab due to the erratic rains or little rain during the monsoon period up-till now.