Agencies/Thiruvananthapuram

Pedestrians use umbrellas after getting caught in a sudden downpour in New Delhi yesterday. The Indian capital was engulfed by a duststorm followed by an unseasonal rainfall. The rain brought some respite to people reeling under a blistering heatwave for the past one week
The annual monsoon, crucial to India’s food production and economic growth, arrived yesterday on the Kerala coast four days behind schedule, the meteorological department said.
Monsoon rains were recorded in Kerala and will now sweep across India, bringing torrential downpours over the coming months to millions of farmers who rely on the seasonal precipitation.
“The monsoon arrived in Kerala today and it will now progress along the country’s western coast,” Indian Meteorological Department director B P Yadav said.
Yadav said the strength of the rains yesterday was “moderate,” while long-term forecasts have predicted an average monsoon this year.
Although moderate-to-heavy rains have been lashing most parts of Kerala for some days, the IMD made the monsoon announcement only yesterday.
Kottayam, Alappuzha, Ernakulam and Kasargode have been lashed by rains. The sea turned rough in Alappuzha, with sea waters encroaching into land at a few places.
But the dry weather continued in the southern districts of Kollam and Thiruvananthapuram.
IMD director general L S Rathore said in New Delhi that the monsoon was expected to advance rapidly into other parts of the country. Karnataka would be lashed by heavy rains within days.
Kerala gets the annual monsoon rains on June 1, marking the start of weeks of showers in the Indian mainland. Last year, however, the monsoon arrived in the state on May 29.
Rathore said there was nothing to panic as the four-day monsoon delay was well within the forecast limits.
From 2005, the IMD has been issuing operational forecasts for the onset of the monsoon over Kerala using an indigenously developed statistical model with a model error of ( /-) four.
The IMD has said that the 2012 southwest monsoon season (June-September) for the country as a whole was most likely to be normal.
“The deviation in arrival of monsoon rains would have no adverse impact on sowing of kharif (summer) crops like paddy and pulses,” Rathore said.
The monsoon normally reaches Delhi by June-end. But according to IMD it is too early to say when the capital will get rains.
“We can only make date-specific forecast towards the end of this month by seeing the spread of monsoon in the rest of the country,” Yadav said.
Agriculture expert Devinder Sharma was, however, cautious.
“The delay in monsoon by a day or two is fine. But the most important thing is the spread of monsoon during June and July, the sowing season for kharif crops,” Sharma said in Delhi.
He said in the last few years, there have been cases when monsoon arrived before time but states like Rajasthan, Gujarat and Bihar did not receive sufficient rains, leading to crop failure.
“I am more worried about the spread of monsoon as more than half of our crop production is dependent on the southwest monsoon,” he said.
IMD official K Santhosh said in Thiruvananthapuram he was getting telephone calls demanding to know why the announcement of monsoon arrival was made when the city was yet to get rains.
Santhosh said a few indicators determine the announcement.
“We have 14 weather stations located at Lakshadweep, in Kerala and in Mangalore. We start to monitor the rains from May 10. If 60% of the stations or more record 2.5mm of rain for two continuous days, then it satisfies the criterion that monsoon has arrived,” Santhosh said.
“Another indicator for the declaration is the strength of the wind,” he added. Cloud movements are another indicator.
While agriculture’s share of India’s economy has shrunk to 14% from 30% in the early 1990s, bountiful rains are still vital to national economic fortunes.
Rural spending accounts for more than 50% of domestic consumption and a poor monsoon hits demand for everything from refrigerators to cars.
The government is banking on a good monsoon to rein in surging food prices, as it also needs a good agricultural performance to spur recent dire growth figures.
Official figures published this month showed the Indian economy growing at 5.3% in the January-March period, the slowest quarterly growth figure in nine years.