The Indian Meteorological Department on Monday said that heavy rainfall is expected in coastal Karnataka on Thursday and Friday. A bulletin said that heavy rainfall is likely to occur at isolated places over Dakshina Kannada and Udupi districts, and over 65 mm rainfall is expected on both days.
Dakshina Kannada, Uttara Kannada and Udupi has been already receiving more than normal rainfall. According to Karnataka State Disaster Monitoring Centre (KSNDMC) data as of October 15, Dakshina Kannada has received 77% excess rainfall in the last 7 days, while Udupi has received 9% more in the same duration. However, Uttara Kannada faced a deficit of 65% over the last week.
Rainfall is also expected in Bengaluru and parts of south interior Karnataka, Malnad (central Karnataka) and some parts of north interior Karnataka.
Sunil M Gavaskar, a meteorologist at the KSNDMC, said, “We are expecting widespread moderate rain and isolated heavy rainfall along with thunderstorm activity for the next 3-4 days in coastal Karnataka. Malnad region will also have isolated places of heavy rainfall. Due to the trough over Tamil Nadu and adjacent areas and cyclonic circulation in north Karnataka, we are also expecting some rainfall in south interior Karnataka, and isolated places in north interior Karnataka region also.”
The districts which are likely to receive rainfall include Bagalkot, Belagavi, Ballari, Vijayapura, Chamarajanagara, Chikkaballapura, Chikkamagaluru, Chitradurga, Devanagari, Dharwad, Gadag, Hassan, Haveri, Kodagu, Koppal, Mandya, Mysore, Raichur, Ramanagara, Shimoga and Tumkur.
In Kodagu, people are still reeling under the effects of floods in August, with 674 people still in relief camps. A large part of the state is suffering from acute deficient rainfall.
Srinivas Reddy, Managing Director of KSNDMC, said, “Out of 176 taluks, 45 taluks in Malnad and coastal belt are flood affected, while 86 talus we have declared as drought affected. We are also looking at declaring another 14 taluks as drought affected. So only the remaining 25 odd taluks we can say has got normal rainfall.”
The scant rainfall in these areas has largely affected agriculture. Around 9 lakh hectares of targeted sown land went unsown during the Kharif season.
“Even in the 65 lakh hectares of land that has been sown, we are experiencing crop loss in around 20 lakh hectares. This is not the final picture. We are taking further detailed surveys and further crop loss is expected,” he added.
The only bright side is that water levels of major reservoirs which are at a much higher level when compared to this time last year, with decreasing trends in groundwater levels and minor irrigation tanks.
