The India Meteorological Department (IMD) has issued its second-stage long-range forecast for the 2026 southwest monsoon season (June-September), predicting that rainfall across India will be approximately 90% of the long period average (LPA), which falls into the below-normal category. The forecast indicates that Northeast India will receive normal rainfall (94-106% of LPA), while Central India, South Peninsula, and the Monsoon Core Zone (rainfed agricultural areas) are expected to receive below-normal rainfall (less than 94% of LPA). Additionally, June 2026 is forecast to have above-normal temperatures and increased heatwave days across several states including Uttar Pradesh, Haryana, Punjab, Bihar, Odisha, Gujarat, and Andhra Pradesh. El Niño conditions are expected to develop during the monsoon season, which may weaken rainfall activity, while Indian Ocean Dipole conditions remain neutral.
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भारत पर अकाल का खतरा मंडराया, मानसून में 14 फ़ीसदी बारिश कम रहने का अनुमान @MausamStationAdded:
Good morning to all of you.
Respected secretary sir uh MOS and regime sir IMD distinguished scientist and representative from various electronic and print media. First of all, I would like to welcome uh every year I am the issues two stage long range forecast for the monsoon season that is from June to June, July, August, September 4 months and first stage this year first stage already issued on 13th April and today we have updated second stage forecast uh on this uh long range forecast for second stage.
Secretary sir and DM sir will address the press conference and uh sir I request secretary sir to issue the second stage language focus. Thank you.
Very good morning to all of you and uh thank you for coming for early hours of today. uh of course it is very unique uh we have called early morning for a press brief because of there are other constraint to have another meetings and other things. Okay, coming back to uh long period average. You all know that this year we have already as he mentioned that April uh end we have already declared the first announcement and also in the meantime the Elino and other things are also evolving um rapidly and considering all these factor Elino and Indian Ocean dipole and many ocean conditions and we have come up with this uh uh outlook for this particular uh May forecast for the seasonal. So I will just read out what is the uh outcome of uh forecast for this uh monsoon season.
The quantitatively the southwest mountain season rainfall over the country as a whole is likely to be 90% of the long period average 90% actually you remember earlier we have told 92 now it has been reduced to 90 when the category wise it is also come below normal category so it is uh below normal rainfall is most likely over the country as a whole that's what we are expecting as of now and You all know that in the May we always give this homogeneous region wise how it will be uh the monsoon because uh April forecast we don't give anything related to homogeneous but now we come out with the homogeneous but the uncertaintity will be high that's why instead of five range we give only three range in that so in the southwest monsoon seasonal rainfall is most likely to be normal over northeast India northeast India it is roughly about 94 to 106 6% of percentage of long period average and below normal over central and south peninsula India that is roughly about less than 94% of long period average and northwest India it is roughly about less than 92% of long period average and the core June core zone is monsoon core zone consisting of the most of the uh what is called rainford agriculture areas uh in the country is likely to below normal. It is roughly about less than 94% of long period average and also most of the seasonal distribution where it will be that it is not much change than what is April it has been given slightly change maybe when Dr. Dr. Makovatra comes out with the presentation roughly about the spatial distribution where it is going to be uh less and more that he will explain and also in this uh month of June the average rainfall for the country as a whole for during the uh month of June 2026 is most likely to be below normal it is less than 92%.
And also June 26 above north the temperature also it is most of places is maximum temperature expected most of the places and uh except some parts of central and northwest east India the temperature will be maximum that means more than uh normal and essentially the elino also it is evolving of course as of now the elino conditions are transitioning towards from Elino conditions over the equatorial Pacific. The latest model various Indian model as well as other international uh coupled model shows that conditions are likely to develop very soon and it is already started because it is also we are looking for 3 months moving average. So we have to wait for some time even though if it is uh crossed the threshold temperature of central Pacific but we have to wait for until this one. So likely we are going to face uh maybe in June July roughly about uh uh just starting the elino then maybe August little bit of moderate maybe in the later off maybe little bit moderate to strong separ is expected to be uh coming and at present the Indian Ocean dipole condition is basically it is uh what is called observed over the uh the conditions are Basically it is uh not positive or negative. It is neutral conditions prevail and it is continue to be there until June July. Later on we have to see how it is evolving. As of now it is uh neutral conditions. So with this this is the main thing maybe we can update in the next uh uh bulletin of seasonal monsoon uh forecast in the month of June and so we'll have more and more better uh value especially the elino condition how it is evolving because it is going on which is rapidly increasing the temperature so how it is evolving we will come to know very soon then accordingly we will update in the jun thank you very Namaskar.
Respected secretary, Minister of Senses, distinguished friends from President Media and our friends from Minister of Ard and other organizations.
June, September Second stage long range forecast of monsoon season rainfall 90% model plus - 4% September.
June September 94 to 106%.
Long 94% less 92% comes central Long 94% come foreign.
Long 92% for this man.
forum temperature.
Uttar Pradesh, Hana, Punjab, Bihar, Odisa, Satisgar, Gujarat or Andhra Pradesh.
Maharashtra, Telangana, Himatal Pradesh 12 days.
Okay.
Southern oscillation.
Hindi Mahas, Indian Ocean, Mons climate forecast system or climate models.
IOD presentation.
This is the updated long range forecast outlook for 2026 in June to September and monthly landfall and temperature outlook for uh June 2026.
So if you look at um the rainfall so far you will find that in the month of um May the rainfall for the country as a whole has been about 4% above the normal and for the season if we consider this is of course of 27th May it is about 1% above the normal So what I want to say that um in the month of May as well as for the season light so there has been good rainfall activity especially if you look at seasonal rainfall over the northern parts of the country except Jam Kashmir Ladak and Ornatal Pradesh all other metro subdivisions have received normal to excess and activity. Similar is the case with respect to southern part except um some parts of Maharashtra, Telangana and Andhra Pradesh where it has been deficient or scant even um or large deficient over the region.
Similar is the case if you consider district wise rainfall distribution um uh in the month of May. So you can see on the left hand side. So most of the northern districts and southern districts have got good rainfall activity any normal or excess rainfall activity and the districts in the west central especially covering Gujarat, South Rajasthan, Maharashtra they have been deficient rainfall districts.
So when we consider southeast monsoon normally southeast monsoon sets in over andor islands around 20th near port blair and this year by 16th the southeast monsoon advanced over andamico islands near port blair and um major part of sea southern parts of b of bengal and thereafter southeast monsoon has advanced further in um um three different uh stages and as of today it has covered um many parts of um South Arabian Sea uh South Bay of Bengal, some parts of East Central Bay of Bengal and the green line which is drawn near 27th May that the last um advance of the southeast monsoon. So that indicates that it has gone up to uh some parts of eententral bay even the southern parts of Myanmar.
So as for the forecast is concerned yes during next 2 days it is also expected to advance further in some more parts of Bengal and Arabian Sea and um uh we are expecting that um the conditions um will become favorable further to advance into southern parts of peninsula especially some parts of Keralakad during next one week and also some parts of northeastern states. Thereafter it also continue to move further to some more parts of south peninsula and northeastern states.
So this is um uh the strategy what we adopt for um the long range forecast and for snow from 2021. We are providing this special distribution rainfall and also rainfall for different months one month in advance and seasonal rainfall one season in advance.
Now before I go for the detail presentation about the expected rainfall you can look at um uh this is the elino conditions. So uh this AMJ means April May June the average condition April May June indicates it is the neutral condition dominating more than 80 80% and when you go to May June July the red color which indicates the elino condition is dominating it becomes 82%.
And when you go to June, July, August, it becomes 92%, and July, August, September. So gradually increases the probability of occurrence of Lenino is increasing as for the forecast given by the various models. On the right hand side, you can see the various forecast from different models. So majority of models indicate that Elino condition is like to develop during monsoon season.
Now if you look at um this is u another forecast by the international center Noah CPC and so it shows that the probability of weak alino conditions moderate alino condition or strong elino conditions. So if you look at um the definitions weak eleno is called as the um surface temperature normally varying between 0.5°C to 1°C.
If it is 1 to 1.5°C it is moderate elino 1.5 to 2°C it is the strong elino and more than 2°C it is the very strong elino conditions so as for our forecast we are expecting that weak elenino condition will develop in the month of June itself and in July and August weak to moderate elino condition will prevail and September mo to strong then towards end of September it may be strong otherwise the most part of the monsoon it will go as weak to moderate uh elino conditions but postcon season will have the strong elino conditions. So and that is reflected if you look at various probabilities given in the table itself.
I'm not going to discuss that. Now if you consider the Indian Ocean dipole um uh if you look at the diagram the green one is the neutral conditions the red one is the positive Indian Ocean dipole and there is uh the blue one that is negative Indian Ocean dipole. So there is no blue one here only you are getting the bars of green and red. So the green is dominating that means neutral in ocean condition is prevailing now and as per various forecasts issued by the international centers and our monsoon mission climate forecast system uh this neutral in conditions likely to continue during the monsoon season. Same is also reflected if you look at the various uh models which provide Indian Ocean type forecast that is also indicating the same and these are these members in the top and the bottom diagram and red one is the forecast you can see that it is in the neutral phase but however the value is increasing over the period of time when you move towards the month of August September October that means toward the second half of the months though it is neutral condition but it will be inching towards the positive Indian Ocean dipole.
So it is called as normal when it is within plus -0.4°C.
If it is greater than 0.4 it is positive Indian Ocean dipole. If it is less than minus0.4 it is called as negative Indian Ocean dipole.
Now let us come to the forecast. Um as it was told by secretary minister of earth sciences quantitatively we are expecting the monsoon season of rainfall during 1 June to 30th September to be about 90% of the long period average with a model error of plus minus 4%.
This 90% belongs to the below normal category. So rainfall is expected to be below normal and um long period average is defined based on data of past 50 years that is 1971 to 2020 and it is about 87 uh cm.
So therefore rainfall will be 90% of the 87 cm for the country as a whole. The probability forecasts if you just look at um we provide five category probability forecast one is the deficient below normal normal abnormal and excess. So you can find out that we have two probabilities. One is the climatological probability that is um um based on the past 100 years of data.
What is the probability of a year becoming excess or deficient or above normal or below normal or normal that depicts the last column and the last 41 column provides the forecast probability based on various parameters utilized for um the monful forecast and based on the probability model we calculate the forecast probability. So what you find from here that there is um very high probability for rainfall becoming below normal that is um 84%.
So now let us look at the rainfall forecast for different homogeneous regions. So northeast India which includes all northeastern states west Bengal and Sikkim, Jharkand and Bihar.
this area is expected to have the normal rainfall.
Uh and here the normal is defined as 94% to 106% of the long period average rainfall of this region. If you consider the northeast India which includes Kashmir, Ladak, Rajasthan, Himal Pradesh, Uttarakhan, Punjab, Hana, Chandigar, Delhi and Uttar Pradesh. um here we are expecting rainfall to be less than 94%.
Similarly, if you consider South India which um uh includes um Karnatak, Kerala, Tamil Nadu, Purjeri, Telangana, Andhra Pradesh and island states like Andonor Island and Lakshadif. Here also we are expecting below normal that is less than 94% of the long average.
Then yeah I have told the central India we are expecting the less than 94% long period average uh that covers um the average rainfall over Gujarat, Maharashtra, Chhattiskar and Chhattisgarh, Odisha and Madhya Pradesh.
Uh there is one more point here the Monsson core zone. The Monsson core zone diagram is shown in the right hand side.
You can see that the central part of country and this area is uh dominated by the rainfed agriculture. So therefore we issue a special forecast. Here also uh rainfall is expected to be below normal that is less than 94% of long period average.
Now let us look at um the forecast of rainfall um in different parts of the country. It is a special map of the southwest mon seasonal rainfall 2026. So you can find out three different colors.
One is the yellow, orange, red indicating different probability of the below normal rainfall. You can find light green to deep green that indicating different probabilities of the normal rainfall. Then light blue to deep blue indicating above normal rainfall activity. So what you find from this diagram that um um we have um green or um uh blue colors um dominating over the parts of south India especially Talangana, Andhra Pradesh and some pockets of um Karnatak and Tamil Nadu.
In addition also you can find out similar case with respect to Odisa and some parts of Chhattiskar and many parts of northeastern states and Jamun Kashmir Ladak and areas of Himatal Pradesh.
So these areas are expected to get normal to above normal rainfall activity. The remaining parts of the country were expecting below normal uh rainfall activity.
So if you look at the forecast performance of this model uh which we introduced in 2021. So it is found that we have given here comparison of the 2016 2020 then 21 to 2025 and also comparison given for first stage forecast and second stage forecast. So I'll first tell about the comparison between previous five years and recent five years. So the absolute error was 7.8% during the period of 2016 to 2020.
Whereas um the recent uh model what we are utilizing providing the special distributions probability etc that is error is 2.2%. That means um the forecast accuracy during the period of 21 to 25 has been always within the error limit of plus minus 4%.
Um which is not the case in the previous five years. We have improved the forecast accuracy. Therefore utilizing the new method of forecasting. Now if you compare um the first stage forecast and the second stage forecast you will find that uh during the period of 21 to 25 the first stage forecast error was 3.1% and second stage forecast error has been 2.2%. That means second stage forecast is uh in general better than the first stage forecast of monsoon.
Now let us look at the rainfall forecast for the June 2026. Um the rainfall averaged over the country as a whole during June 2026 is most likely to be below normal that is less than 92% of the long period average. Here also like the monsoon seasonal pattern you can find the similar pattern in June. We are expecting normal normal rainfall activity in eastern part of south peninsula. uh it is covering uh many parts or most parts of Telangana, South Andra Pradesh, eastern part of Karnatak and many parts of Tamil Nadu and Purueri and also in the north Jamun Kashmir um uh Himatra Pradesh, Punjab and in the east it is the Oruronal Pradesh in the west it is the Saras and southern parts of Rajasthan where you can have normal to above normal rainfall activity. remaining parts of the country we will have many places below normal rainfall activity.
Now if I look at the temperature as we are expecting that rainfall will less certainly therefore the day temperature will be higher and also night temperature is expected higher at many places on the left hand side it is the maximum temperature that is the day temperature representative on the right hand side the minimum temperature representing the night temperature. So what we find that um in day temperature um many parts will have above normal uh temperature except um uh many parts of east and northeast India especially covering Bihar, West Bengal, Jakhand and Assam, Meghal Mam, Tripura etc. and also in some parts of central India like the east MP East Bidar and some parts of Chhattisgarh and then in the northwest India covering Jamun Kashmir Ladak Himachal Uttakand and Punjab and areas of Rajasthan and North Hana where you'll have normal to below normal maximum temperature average temperature for the month. If I consider the minimum temperature, the central part of the country um extending from southern parts of Rajasthan and some parts of Gujarat to South Odisa that is expected to have normal to below normal temperature otherwise um remaining parts are expected to have the above normal minimum temperature or night temperature. So there are certain areas therefore you can find out like say Uttar Pradesh and western western Madhya Pradesh and southern parts of peninsula where both maximum temperature and min expected to be above normal.
That means that you can expect the heat conditions along with that also warm night conditions in certain days.
Now let us look at the heatwave forecast for the month of June. um during June 2026. On the left hand side the diagram depicts the number of days of heat wave expected um um during the month of June and on right hand side it shows the climatology of a heat wave. If you just look in the month of June, climate says that he frequency is quite high and it can be three days um in the northwest India plans of northwest India covering Punjab, Hana, Chandigar, Delhi, UP and Rajasthan and Northwest MP and this year's forecast says that um we have about two to three days more over UP, Punjab, Hana and Arjen as a final etc and in some parts of coastal east coast states and Gujarat and specifically if I state the names of names of the U states it is um above normal heat of days are expected over parts of Uttar Pradesh, Hiana, Punjab, Bihar, Jar Bihar um not Jaran sorry Odisa, Chhattiskar, Gujarat um and Andhra Pradesh and isolated regions of Maharashtra, Telangana, Himachal Pradesh and Tamil Nadu Rajasthan and Jarkand are expected to have less than normal number of heat of days as you can see in the blue color.
So now I will tell you the summary. So quantitatively the southwest monsoon seasonal rainfall over the country as a whole is likely to be 90% of the long period average with a model error of plus - 4%. indicating that below normal rainfall is likely for the country during June to September 2026. In southwest monsoon season, rainfall is most likely to be normal over northeast India and below normal um over central and south India that is less than 94% long period average and over northeast India it is less than 92% of long period average. Then southwest monsoon seasonal rainfall for the monsoon core zone consisting of uh most of the rainfed agriculture area in the country is most likely to be below normal that is less than 90% 94% of long period average.
Average rainfall for the country as a whole during June 2026 is most likely to be below normal that is less than 92% of long period average. Currently neutral elino southern o conditions are transitioning towards elino conditions over the equatorial Pacific region. The latest climate model forecast indicate that the elino conditions are likely to develop during the southeast monsoon season. Neutral Indian Ocean conditions are observed over Indian Ocean and latest models indicate that neutral Indian conditions are likely to continue during the monsoon season. Thank you.
Now we have interaction section. You have any question you can ask.
So you said about this climatic climatology forecast and the probability forecast. So how when the climatology forecast is saying that there may be normal monsoon why you went for this below normal prediction?
The the first one is a quantitative forecast that is what what you are saying about 90% of long period of age which quantity but whereas when you are talking about probability what is the likely to be occurring that probability that is different entirely different uh statistical things that is a probability of occurrence of below normal uh maybe above normal or normal all these categories five categories So these are the two different things but we expect that from dynamical model we get country as a whole you are going to expect roughly about 90% of the long period of >> that is uh there is uh no climatological forecast probability that is the climatology of occurrence based on the past 100 years of data is the percentage of Yes.
Which experienced deficient rainfall which experienced excess rainfall normal rainfall bel it is 16% for example deficient rainfall 17% is example 33% normal rainfall against that whatever our model probability that is given here. So 84% we told that there is a probability that it will be below normal than collectivity. So it is just comparison purpose we have put up there >> that is what was >> yes >> but now this year what will be >> so forecast therefore there is unonymity in the statistical model what we have and the dynamical model the rainfall will be below normal.
>> Sir Jes from Hindustan times I wanted to know what will your advice be to the agricultural community considering that June onwards we are likely to see below normal rainfall.
See for agriculture community definitely agriculture ministry will have a because we have communicated this weather forecast how it will be definitely it is their way of uh we cannot able to tell what to do what not to do but they will be in a position better position to answer that particular sum 90% below normal suka is not declared by minister of sciences or Okay.
Normal rainfall below normal rainfall deficient rainfall.
Second exact dates will provide on daytoday basis within next one week there will be mon advance >> over different parts of Arabian Sea covering most parts of South Arabian Sea most parts of South Bay of Bengal Then some more parts of east central bioengal, some parts of the extreme south peninsula and northeastern states.
Normal date is June with a standard plus seven days.
Peninsula states below normal rainfalls breaks.
Below normal rainfall July or August Break forecast% country September 90% long Long 87% plus 4% 86% 94% it so 90% 90% 95% 964%.
Yeah. So Vijay from end so I just want to learn from your side you know since like again you know like the question is related to you know like my colleague.
So he mentioned like last time when you did a forecast on 30th May you said like uh the monsoon will hit the Kerala coast on 26th plus minus of 4 days right so if I wish to write what is the exact you know like how can we write as like is when it is likely to hit the Kerala coast so can we have a little bit precise you know like what >> yeah we'll provide the date but at present what I told you during next seven days monsoon advance will be there and it'll be covering some parts of extreme south peninsula and some parts of northeast India exactly on which date it will touch Kerala that information will provide >> basically the it is advanced it has come actually unfortunately it is not coming to the mainland if you see in the entire Arabian sea southeastern Arabian sea rain over the ocean it is there but it is not coming to the land once it is happen in land then only we can declare that's why we are waiting Thank you. Thank you.
>> Thank you all. I would like to invite you to join height that is the back side of this close.
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