Pune: The city has already received more rain than its normal quota for the entire June-Sept monsoon season, recording 655.6mm till Tuesday morning as against the seasonal average of 647.2mm.The excess, however, has been driven largely by one exceptionally wet spell in July, while both June and Aug have recorded below-normal rainfall.The city has received the seasonal quota with more than six weeks still remaining before the official southwest monsoon ends on Sept 30. According to the IMD’s 1971-2020 rainfall averages, the city usually receives 166.3mm in June, 189.1mm in July, 145.5mm in Aug and 146.3mm in Sept, totalling 647.2mm.A weather expert associated with Vagaries of the Weather said Pune’s June 1-Aug 18 rainfall this year was still lower than during the corresponding period in 2019 and 2024. “This year, only July has been excess. June was deficient. Aug is also running below normal,” the expert said. Pune has recorded around 68mm in Aug till 8.30am on Tuesday.The concentration of rainfall in July was unusually high. IMD scientist SD Sanap had earlier said a large share of Pune’s seasonal rainfall came during the first eight days of July, when the city received rainfall comparable to its normal seasonal accumulation in just that short period.He attributed the intense spell to a combination of favourable weather systems, including a depression over Bay of Bengal, an offshore trough and an east-west shear zone around 21°N.The exceptionally heavy rainfall in the Sahyadri Ghats has provided another indication of how concentrated the monsoon activity has been in the region. Tamhini Ghat recorded 8,041mm of rainfall by Aug 17, including 50mm on Monday, crossing the 8,000mm mark in just 55 days since monsoon arrived there on June 23.Tamhini received 369mm in June, 5,710mm in July and another 1,962mm between Aug 1 and 17. Weather expert Abhijit Modak said, “The milestone reflected the sustained rainfall over the central Western Ghats this monsoon, with July alone accounting for more than 5.7m of rain.”While Pune’s reservoirs have benefited from the overall rainfall, hydrologists have flagged the need to better capture the substantial runoff generated during intense spells, particularly in an increasingly urbanised landscape.Senior hydrogeologist Upendra Dhonde said, “The city needs a more comprehensive strategy to use the additional water generated during intense rainfall instead of allowing it to leave the urban watershed as runoff and flash floods. Experts from govt, NGOs and academia should come forward to have a foolproof strategy for Pune city or any urban area to utilise the potential of groundwater recharge created from such flash floods.”He said measures could include assessing and restoring the holding capacity of existing ponds, improving opportunities for groundwater seepage along smaller streams and using suitable open spaces as groundwater recharge centres. “With Pune’s population continuing to depend heavily on dams and peripheral areas relying substantially on tankers and groundwater, better management of the city’s surface and groundwater resources would become increasingly important.”
