IMD drops word 'drought', replaces with 'deficient' to describe bad monsoon

Amid a confusion over who is competent to declare "drought", the India Meteorological Department (IMD) has decided to drop the word and replace it with "deficient" to describe a bad monsoon.

Henceforth, based on the rainfall and its distribution across the country in a season, it will only declare a "deficient" or "largely deficient year".

"Declaring drought was never the mandate of the IMD. It is the job of the state government. Our task is to say whether the rainfall is normal or deficient. Interpretation is the job of the state government," said IMD Director General Laxman Singh Rathore. 

He added there was no uniform definition of the term drought. "There are several types of drought and no uniform definition of the term. There is meteorological drought, hydrological drought and even a socio-economic drought," Rathore said.

IMD's National Weather Forecast Centre's Director Bramha Prakash Yadav said henceforth if 20-40% of the country receives deficient rainfall, it will be declared as "deficient year". If it goes beyond 40%, it will be declared a "largely deficient year".

"While describing rainfall percentage departures of all India monsoon seasonal rainfall, the following classification may be used. Description of rainfall condition as 'Drought' may be discontinued. When the rainfall deficiency is more than 10% and 20 to 40% area of the country is under drought conditions. When the rainfall deficiency is more than 10% and when the spatial coverage of drought is more than 40%," an IMD circular said.

The decision of changing the terminology was taken after a committee, constituted in 2014, gave its recommendations in November last year. The recommendations came into force from January 1.

Apart from recommendations on monsoon deficiency, suggestions that were accepted included changing the terminologies of heat and cold waves.

"To declare heat and cold waves, the following criteria should be met at least in 2 stations in a Met sub-division for at least two consecutive days and it will be declared on the second day. Forecasts of heat and cold waves over a sub-division will be issued only if at least two stations in the sub-division are expected to experience such conditions," the circular added.