In a bad news for the country in general and the agriculture sector in particular, monsoon rains this year will be "deficient', the government announced on Tuesday.


Union Science and Technology Minister Dr Harsh Vardhan informed that the Indian Meteorological Department (IMD) has revised its rainfall forecast from 93 to 88 percent, i.e. from "below normal" to "deficient".


This means India will be experiencing two consecutive years of "deficient' rains as 2014 too had turned out be a drought year.


Drought is when India experiences monsoon rains below 90 percent of the long-period average (LPA). LPA is the average annual rainfall (89 cm) recorded between 1951 and 2000.


Harsh Vardhan said the north-west region which includes Delhi NCR, Haryana, western Uttar Pradesh and Rajasthan will be affected as per the forecast.


The Southwest Monsoon has already missed its date with Kerala and is now expected to hit the southern state three days late on June 4. The IMD, in its preliminary forecast, had said that the Southwest Monsoon rains will hit the Kerala coast on May 30.


In its initial annual forecast of rainfall, the IMD had in April predicted the chances of a normal Monsoon at just 28%. The revision of forecast deals a blow to the farm sector which has seen poor back-to-back kharif and rabi seasons.


RBI governor Raghuram Rajan today said the risks to inflation identified
in April could cloud the picture with below par monsoons forecast for the second successive year.