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Cyclonic Storm Stalls India's Monsoon, Not Unusual |
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| INDIA: June 5, 2007 | ||
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NEW DELHI - India's monsoon rains have been static over the southern coast since last Tuesday because of a cyclonic storm in the Arabian Sea but the situation is not unusual, a weather department official said on Monday.
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The June-September monsoon is vital to the health of India's near-trillion-dollar economy as it determines farm output and subsequent rural demand for a range of consumer products. "It is over the Karwar area in Karnataka since May 29. It has not moved since then. We have got a cyclonic storm over the Arabian Sea," the official said. She said it could take two to three days for the storm to fade away, and allow the monsoon to move deeper into India. "There has been less than normal rains over Kerala and Karnataka because of the storm," the official said. "Normally, the monsoon comes to Maharashtra by June 7 and to Mumbai by June 10. But we will have to wait." Timely arrival of rains helps several crops including cotton, soybean, groundnut and rice, provided the rainfall is spread evenly. The weather official said a break in monsoon usually happened every year for various reasons, and was not alarming. India's economy, Asia's third-largest, grew 9.4 percent in the fiscal year ended March 2007, the government said last week, the strongest pace since a 10.5 percent expansion in 1988/89. Monsoon rains arrived over the South Andaman Sea on May 10 and over the Kerala coast on May 28, three days ahead of schedule.
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REUTERS NEWS SERVICE
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