India wet and wary as rains arrive
By Sudha Ramachandran
THIRUVANANTHAPURAM, south India - The arrival of the monsoons at India's
southern doorstep, Kerala state, on May 31, ended weeks of speculation and
uncertainty over when precisely they would arrive this year. As always, the
debut was dramatic, an electrifying performance that never disappoints.
But the drama of the southwest monsoon has only just begun unfolding. As it
races up the west coast and quickly engulfs all of India in the coming weeks,
it will lower temperatures and cool tempers across the peninsula and the plains
and could well determine the fortunes of India's ruling coalition in upcoming
general elections.
The monsoons have always been central to Indian life. The
season has for centuries been celebrated through poetry, painting, music and
dance. Economists and weather experts, however, interpret this season of
romance in terms of millimeters of rain and impact on crops.
The southwest monsoon sweeps the Indian sub-continent from June to September
every year, accounting for 80% of India's annual rainfall. In the past, weak
monsoons would devastate millions of farmers and push the economy into
recession. A poor monsoon has spelt electoral disaster for ruling parties.
Analysts say that with the agricultural sector's contribution to India's
economy shrinking in recent years, the monsoon's impact on the economy and its
political implications have fallen to some extent. Yet the path of the monsoon
is carefully tracked, its waxing and waning closely monitored and debates on
monsoon performance engage economic planners.
While a poor monsoon may no longer drive the economy into recession, it is a
critical determinant of agricultural performance. In a country where over 60%
of the population is engaged in agriculture and only 40% of arable land is
irrigated, it is not difficult to see why the monsoons are so important to
lives and livelihoods or why they are so keenly watched.
It is not just farmers and economic planners who anxiously track the monsoon's
advance.
By mid-April, as temperatures soar past 42 degrees Celsius in vast swathes of
the country, Indians begin looking up to the heavens, desperately seeking
respite from the sweltering heat. As heat waves sweep across the plains in May,
desperation builds and conversations - normally dominated by politics or
cricket - veer towards the much anticipated monsoons.
A few thundershowers and the countdown begins. The stage is set for the arrival
of the monsoons.
By the third week of May, all eyes turn to Kerala, the state where the monsoon
makes its grand entry, and whose meteorological station at Thiruvananthapuram
is charged with the responsibility of announcing the monsoon's "official
arrival". The top weatherman predicts the date of the monsoon's arrival, but
the monsoon is a capricious phenomenon. It teases India, tearing towards the
coast and then pulling away. Thick grey clouds race across the sky, only to
disappear.
It is an agonizing wait but the meteorological department will not officially
declare the southwest monsoon's onset until at least 60% of the Kerala weather
stations show sufficient downpour for two consecutive days. And when that
happens, the much-awaited announcement comes from the weatherman at
Thiruvananthapuram. It's official: the monsoons have arrived.
While one arm of the southwest monsoon races up the west coast, another
stretches across the Bay of Bengal, where it then swings into India's
northeast, embracing and drenching all of India by mid-July.
This year's monsoon is particularly important for easing pressure on food grain
supplies, which has stoked inflation to a four-year high of 8.1%. India has
suspended the export of rice and other staple foods to deal with the situation
but good rains will produce a good harvest and help ease food prices. And it's
not just agriculture that the monsoon will impact; it has implications for
tourism, insurance, consumer goods sales, aviation, manufacturing,
construction, sports and more. A good monsoon will stimulate many sectors.
"If we get good rains, we will probably see a top-off in inflation in August to
around 7% levels," Indranil Sengupta, chief economist at DSP Merrill Lynch,
told the CNBC-TV18 channel. But if the monsoon is bad, "Inflation will go into
double digits and make things much worse. Rice is very sensitive this year,
because international prices are so combustible. In oil seeds also we had a gap
in the winter crop because of very combustible prices and same with pulses. So,
it is a very delicate situation in our view."
Early indications are positive. Meteorological department officials say that
while the monsoon's advance has been slow, "the overall rainfall has been more
than normal". "Our prediction for the entire season is that the rainfall will
be near normal," A B Mazumdar, director of weather forecasting, Indian
Meteorological Department at Pune, has said.
Even as Indians sit back to enjoy the monsoons they will have to prepare for
the deluge of problems that lie ahead. With monsoons come floods and tens of
thousands will face displacement. Then there are the usual epidemics that
strike alongside the monsoons - malaria, cholera and diarrhea.
The monsoons will also lay bare the frailty of India's urban infrastructure.
Ahead of the rains, civic officials routinely claim that their infrastructure
is ready to take on the monsoons, but when the rains come, roads and homes go
under water, narrow storm drains burst with the city's waste and scores are
washed away into open sewers.
Billions of rupees have been set aside to enable urban infrastructure to stand
up to the monsoons, but much of it is likely to have made its way into personal
pockets. This year, too, it does seem that Mumbai's Shanghai dreams and
Bangalore's Singapore ambitions will be washed away by the monsoons.
Sudha Ramachandran is an independent
journalist/researcher based in
Bangalore.
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