Monsoon clouds gather on Bengal

The monsoon is likely to hit Bengal in the next two or three days, at least 10 days earlier than usual, the Met office today said.

Before that, the next two days could see heavy rain in Calcutta and the south Bengal districts, raising the hope that this summer’s heat wave-like conditions may now be over.

The Met office issued a cyclone alert tonight, warning of heavy rain in south Bengal in the next 48 hours and asking fishermen not to go to sea. The expected cyclonic storm and the early monsoon onset are related.

A depression formed over the west central Bay of Bengal today and was 600km from Calcutta, Met officials said tonight. It is likely to intensify into a cyclonic storm and move towards Bengal and the Bangladesh coast, triggering the next two days’ rain.

“The rapid progress of the monsoon is also being caused by the depression, which is dragging the monsoon currents faster towards the state,” said G.C. Debnath, the director of the weather section at the Regional Meteorological Centre in Alipore. “We expect the monsoon to set in within the next two or three days. We expect the depression to drag the monsoon into north and south Bengal on the same day.”

The monsoon usually hits north Bengal on June 5 and south Bengal three days later. The last time these rain-bearing winds had arrived in south Bengal so early was 10 years ago, on May 28, 1999.

A Met official said that once the monsoon currents set in, the maximum temperature is not expected to rise beyond 35-36°C. Debnath said the next two days’ rain “may cross 250mm at one or two places”.

The monsoon today moved into Kerala nine days before the normal arrival date of June 1. An early onset, though, has no apparent correlation with monsoon behaviour. The India Meteorological Department has predicted 96 per cent of the average rainfall this year.