MYSURU: Cloud seeding, to ensure rainfall over parts of the state suffering from a weak monsoon, was announced last week amid much fanfare. However, the Karnataka Rural Development and Panchayat Raj department has realised that the exercise is moot over southern Karnataka due to the absence of reflective water-bearing clouds.
According to the plan, cloud seeding is to be carried out for 90 days with aircraft based out of Mysuru and Hubbali. While the aircraft from Mysuru did carry out the exercise on July 28, it could not continue as the expert team advising the operation said that they could not find reflective clouds over the Mysuru region.
These experts, based in Bengaluru, identify the clouds with radar and the aircraft flies above them to release silver iodide particles that reach the cloud and form ice-crystals. With a list of priority districts, the experts have been watching out for promising clouds over Kolar, Tumakuru, Chitradurga and other districts based on the drought condition, soil moisture levels and other factors.
The operations will give a miss to Kodagu, which witnessed landslides last year as well as Belagavi, which is witnessing flooding following heavy downpours in neighbouring Maharashtra. Officials claimed that the operation had witnessed better results in Vijayapura.
Several areas of the state have witnessed a deficit in rainfall of more than 30 per cent, barring a few districts in Malnad. In Bengaluru, operations will not be carried out due to heavy air traffic at the Kempegowda International Airport, the HAL airport and a few more airstrips.
Speaking to The New Indian Express, Chief Engineer of the RDPR department, Prakash said, “It is a 90-day exercise and we are confident of success if there are reflective clouds that can be targeted. The aircraft has an endurance of 4-5 hours and would complete 150 hours monthly. It is used only when the experts identify clouds for seeding.”
“Since the project has just started, we are hopeful that in the coming weeks, we will be able to enhance the rainfall,” he said.
Meanwhile, Karnataka is left with just 25 days of monsoon and the farmers who have prepared their fields to take up sowing have decided not to, as they fear that their investment will be lost. On the other hand farmers have taken to the streets against the discharge of water to Tamil Nadu from Krishnaraja Sagar and Kabini reservoirs at a time when there is no steady increase in inflow into the reservoirs.