While the monsoon advanced to parts of Maharashtra and eastern India, the weather office does not see much respite from the soaring temperature in north India, and forecast that a heat wave will likely hit parts of the region from Wednesday.Head of the National Weather Forecasting Centre at the India Meteorological Department (IMD) Sathi Devi said the monsoon has advanced to several parts of Maharashtra and Konkan region."The southwest monsoon has crossed central Arabian Sea and entered north Arabian Sea touching Valsad in Gujarat. It arrived in Mumbai, Nasik, Parbhani in Maharashtra, Adilabad in Andhra Pradesh and Paradip in Odisha," Sathi Devi told IANS.She said that the monsoon also reached Kolkata and Digha in West Bengal and was slowly progressing towards northwestern part of the country.The weather office said that the southwest monsoon has further advanced to remaining parts of north interior Karnataka, Rayalaseema, entire Telangana, some more parts of coastal Andhra Pradesh, most parts of west, central and north Bay of Bengal, remaining parts of Tripura, Assam and Meghalaya, most parts of sub-Himalayan West Bengal and Sikkim.The IMD also forecast heat wave conditions in several isolated places in Uttar Pradesh and other regions of northern India for a few days and rise in the maximum temperature.
"Heat wave conditions are very likely in isolated places over Punjab, Haryana, Chandigarh, Delhi and Uttar Pradesh from Wednesday to Friday," the weather office predicted.Devi said it would take the monsoon some time to reach Uttar Pradesh and other parts of northern India.Normally, the monsoon should reach Uttar Pradesh by June 15, but the weather office has not yet made any predictions on this."Right now, no favourable conditions are seen, so we have not yet made any statement regarding when the monsoon will hit Uttar Pradesh or Delhi," Devi said.Earlier this month, the IMD announced India would receive 98 per cent rainfall this monsoon between June and September, with an error estimate of four per cent. The weather office had predicted the season's rainfall to be 96 per cent of the long period average (LPA) over northwest India, 100 per cent of LPA over central India, 99 per cent of LPA over southern peninsula and 96 per cent of LPA over northeast India -- all with a model error of plus-minus eight per cent.Under northwest India fall Uttar Pradesh, Uttarakhand, Haryana, Delhi, Punjab, Himachal Pradesh, Jammu and Kashmir and Rajashtan, while Andhra Pradesh, Telangana, Tamil Nadu, Karnataka, Kerala, Lakshadweep, and the Andaman and Nicobar Islands come under south peninsula.According to the weatherman, below 90 per cent rainfall is considered deficient and at 95 per cent, it is considered below normal.A figure between 96 and 104 per cent of rainfall indicates a normal monsoon and between 105 and 110 per cent above normal.