BENGALURU: While the extent of effects of climate change has become a topic of global debate, its impacts are being felt even in South-Interior Karnataka where Bengaluru is located.
Despite the arrival of monsoon, rainfall in the region, including in Bengaluru, has been restricted to brief spells in the evenings. The reason is reportedly a gradually changing monsoon pattern over the past many years, say weathermen. This has resulted in the weakening of South-West monsoon and strengthening of pre-monsoon in South-Interior parts of Karnataka.
In spite of having received heavier than usual pre-monsoon rain, South- Interior parts of Karnataka, including Bengaluru, have received comparatively low rainfall since the monsoon reached the region on June 3. Professor HS Shivaramu, head, Agro-Meteorology Department, University of Agricultural Sciences, Bengaluru, said this phenomenon is not an anomaly, but the continuation of a trend formed over the past many years.
Prof Shivaramu said human activities such as deforestation had caused this shift. “The South-West monsoon arrives here via coastal Karnataka and Malnad, but now those areas are getting most of the rain. We keep instructing farmers to change their cropping patterns to match the weather patterns,” he added.
Confirming this, Project Scientist (Hydrologist) at Karnataka State Natural Disaster Monitoring Centre (KSNDMC) Shubha Avinash said, “The monsoon pattern has been such that as soon as it reaches here, there is good rainfall for a week to 10 days, after which it takes a break, followed by good rains again in July.”
She said as per an earlier forecast, heavier rainfall in the region was to return by June 24, but did not.
Mahesh Palawat, Chief Meteorologist at Skymet, a private weather services firm, said the current conditions of low rain were due to the lack of significant weather system developing over Southern parts of the Bay of Bengal. “Systems formed over the Arabian Sea normally move away from the coast towards the North-West, and draw moisture away from interior parts of the peninsula, hence reducing rain here,” he said.
Sunil M Gavaskar, a scientist at KSNDMC, said as per information available for the next one week, the monsoon won’t become active until then and as per a long-range forecast prediction, it might get revived in July. However, statistics for the amount of rainfall for Bengaluru Urban and rural districts indicate normal to surplus rainfall during the monsoon. Gavaskar attributed this to the good rainfall received during the first two weeks of June.
