Rainfall and other forms of Precipitation

Featured Articles
September 13, 2022
Chaos in a concrete jungle
Heavy rains and floods have battered Bengaluru yet again. Uncontrolled and unregulated development and concretisation of the city that pays no heed to the ecology and hydrology of the region needs to stop!
Urban flooding in Bangalore (Image Source: Thejas via Wikimedia Commons)
March 29, 2022
India, in the hot seat!
The intensity and duration of heat waves is predicted to increase in India and human induced anthropogenic changes are to blame.
A man sits under the scorching heat of the sun in front of Amer fort in Jaipur (Picture courtesy: Prabhu B Doss, Flickr Commons: CC-By-NC-ND-2.0)
February 10, 2022
87% of India's districts vulnerable to droughts: IMD
47% of India’s population is vulnerable to floods, says IMD's Climate Hazards Atlas
(Image: J Surya, CC-SA-4.0 International)
July 4, 2021
Did the moody monsoon shrink forests in peninsular India?
A study finds that while forests existed in peninsular India, they were replaced by savanna grasslands over time. And the weakening monsoon was the culprit!
Savanna grasslands at Nannaj Bustard Sanctuary, Solapur, Maharashtra (Image Source: Raju Kasambe via Wikimedia Commons)
June 30, 2021
Climate change likely to affect agricultural productivity in Maharashtra
Climate analysis predicts mismatch in rainfall and temperature patterns with crop phenology: Soybean, Cotton, Wheat and Gram crops at risk, finds Institute for Sustainable Communities study across three major regions of Maharashtra.
Maharashtra faces an increasing risk from climate change which is likely to impact the production of four major crops - Soybean, Cotton, Wheat and Gram. (Image: BAIF Flickr, CC BY-NC-SA 2.0)
December 13, 2019
Trading in virtual water
A study highlights the need to scale down the export of rice, maize, buffalo meat and other items to conserve groundwater in India.
A farmer uses a hosepipe to irrigate crops at her farm in Nilgiris mountains, Tamil Nadu (Image: Hamish John Appleby for IWMI, Flickr Commons, CC BY-NC-ND 2.0)
Raising Sardar Sarovar Dam height would be disastrous: Committee
News this week
Swati Bansal
Posted on 16 Jun, 2015 11:16 AM

Committee warns against raising Sardar Sarovar Dam height
Sardar Sarovar Dam (Source: Shahakshay, Wikipedia)
Yet another expert body formed to review Uttarakhand hydel project
Policy matters this week
Swati Bansal
Posted on 08 Jun, 2015 08:30 PM

Centre constitutes third expert body to review Uttarakhand dams
River Ganga at Kaudiyala, Uttarakhand
India readies for a poor monsoon due to strong possibility of El Nino
News this week
Swati Bansal
Posted on 18 May, 2015 08:59 PM

India prepares to fight the impacts of El Nino
IMD predicts strong El Nino (Source: MSN Weather)
Acute crisis of water, power and medical facilities in Nepal after earthquake
News this week
Swati Bansal
Posted on 28 Apr, 2015 10:39 AM

Nepal earthquake toll exceeds 4300
Earthquake in Nepal (Source: Krish Dulal)
The Maharashtra Groundwater (Development and Management) Act 2009
Shashank Deshpande, Deputy Director GSDA, talks to the India Water Portal on the background and features of the recently passed Maharashtra Groundwater (Development and Management) Act 2009.
Aarti Kelkar- Khambete
Posted on 25 Apr, 2015 02:16 PM

Please provide us some background on the hydrogeology of Maharashtra and its special features, which make it stand out as compared to the other parts of the country.
View of an open well
Facing uncertain rains, farmers dig in
Bankura in West Bengal receives 1000 mm of rainfall a year, yet thousands of adivasi farmers in the area were faced with irrigation issues -- until 'happas' came to the rescue.
Amita Bhaduri
Posted on 20 Apr, 2015 12:40 PM

Amulya Soren couldn’t get stable yields in the kharif (monsoon) paddy in his farm. A member of the Santhal tribe, he was the beneficiary of a surplus land redistribution programme in Hirbandh block of Bankura, West Bengal. The undulating terrain in which his farm lies receives sufficient rainfall of about 1000 mm a year, yet sufficient irrigation was an issue.
Farmers constructing happa; Image: PRADAN
Predicted impacts of droughts on agriculture and food production
The paper presents the findings of a study that attempted to estimate the effect of rainfall on the supply and demand sides of agricultural commodities, and their implications on prices.
Praduman Kumar
P K Joshi
Pramod Aggarwal
Posted on 12 Apr, 2015 10:56 PM

Climate change has been predicted to create increasing risks for the agricultural sector thus inversely affecting agricultural production and farm incomes in India. These risks have already manifested in the form of increasing intensity and extent of droughts, floods, temperature rise and fall, and other calamities in the country.
Severe droughts (Source: Wikimedia Commons)
Unseasonal rains damage crops worth Rs 10,000 crore
News this week
Swati Bansal
Posted on 09 Mar, 2015 08:47 PM

Rabi crop damaged in north and central India
Rainy clouds hovering over Manipur's farmland
Embankments: Engineering solutions or problems?
In his book titled 'Bandini Mahananda', Dinesh Mishra describes the vicious circle of embankments that has created more problems than solutions in Bihar.
Dinesh Mishra
Posted on 02 Mar, 2015 05:12 PM

Mahananda, a major River of north Bihar rises in the Darjeeling district of West Bengal. It meets the Ganga after a journey of 376 km through the flat lands of Bihar, West Bengal and Bangladesh. It would spill its banks because of the flat slopes, causing deluge and waterlogging in the Katihar district of Bihar.
Floods in Bihar; Image: Usha Dewani
Climate change threatens Indian mangroves
Increase in temperatures, carbon dioxide concentration, rise in sea levels and extreme weather events like cyclones and droughts, are predicted to have deleterious effects on Indian mangroves.
S. Sandilyan
Posted on 21 Feb, 2015 07:20 PM

India’s 7500 km coastal line supports nearly 4, 87,100 hectares of mangroves. These unique ecosystems harbour nearly 3985 species of flora and fauna. Due to the increasing effects of climate change, mangrove forests in the country are under serious threat.

What are mangroves?
Sundarban mangrove (Source: Wikimedia Commons)
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