-The Hindu Business Line Advisory urges Kerala farmers to undertake nursery for rice, vegetables and orchard crop Thiruvananthapuram: Meteorological subdivision-level rainfall forecast indicates rainfall activity over South India during June 3 to 9, which can bring the onset of the South-West monsoon. Normal date for onset over Kerala is June 1. The June 3-9 window has been projected in the national agro-met advisory service bulletin based on extended range weather forecast valid for...

Situation alarming: More than one-third population hit by drought   The country is facing severe drought for the second consecutive year. Conservative estimates from official sources show that over a quarter of rural habitations are facing drinking water scarcity. Although both India Meteorological Department and Skymet have predicted a more than normal rainfall during June-September, 2016, the water storage available in 91 major reservoirs of the country has declined from 22 percent...

-Hindustan Times With progressively increasing severity of rising Temperatures and rain deficits over two consecutive years – 2014 and 2015, the Great Indian Drought was always coming. The India Meteorological Department, ministry of home affairs, the ministry of water resources, the Ministry of agriculture and farmers welfare office, and the National Disaster Management Authority knew it. The question is, what did we do with this knowledge? Six hundred million of India’s 1.2 billion...

-The Hindu This could cause monsoon to spill over to October: Officials Australia’s weather bureau said the withering El Nino — among the strongest in history and responsible for two years of consecutive droughts and record summer Temperatures in India — had ended. While that bodes well for the monsoon, weather officials in India said this could also be a precursor to floods during August and September and monsoon possibly spilling over...

-The Times of India NEW DELHI: A day after Rajasthan's Phalodi recorded the country's highest Temperature ever of 51°C, the India Meteorological Department said the frequency of severe heat waves had increased sharply in the past 15 years. Most heat-affected states have no plan in place to prevent mortality and morbidity associated with extreme heat. IMD officials said the average frequency of severe heat waves had doubled from 50 days a year...