Monsoon arrived but India stayed dry: How 5 weather systems caused June's rain deficit

India recorded one of its driest Junes in 146 years as the southwest monsoon stalled despite arriving on time. The rains have since revived in some regions, but the science of the stall reveals why much of the country stayed dry.

In Short

• The southwest monsoon advanced quickly by mid-June before a long pause
• India recorded over 40 per cent rainfall deficit during the dry spell
• A weak MJO and Somali Jet reduced cloud formation and moisture

The monsoon has arrived. Much of India is still waiting for the rain.

That contradiction defined June 2026, one of the driest Junes in 146 years of record-keeping. The southwest monsoon reached the Kerala coast on June 4, a little behind schedule, and by June 15 had covered most of the south, east and northeast. Then it stalled.

For nearly a fortnight, the skies went quiet over large parts of the country, and India ran a rainfall shortfall of more than 40 per cent, with central India over 60 per cent below normal.

The rains have since revived in some regions, but the deficit built up in June will take time to erase.

WHY HAS INDIA'S MONSOON STALLED?

The monsoon rarely fails for one reason. This time, five rain-suppressing systems lined up together.

The first is a weak Madden-Julian Oscillation, or MJO, a vast pulse of clouds and thunderstorms that circles the equator every 30 to 60 days. When it parks over the Indian Ocean, it switches the rain on. In June, it drifted away and took the trigger with it.

The second is a feeble Somali Jet, the low-level wind that races across the equator from East Africa and carries moisture from the Arabian Sea to India. It is the monsoon's supply line, and it was running well below capacity.

Third, hot dry air swept in from the deserts of northwest India and West Asia, settling over central India like a lid that stops clouds from building into rain.

Fourth, the Indian Ocean Dipole, the temperature seesaw between the western and eastern Indian Ocean, stayed neutral, denying the monsoon the lift a warmer western ocean usually provides.

Fifth, the Bay of Bengal failed to spin up the low-pressure systems that normally pull rain deep inland.

IS EL NINO TO BLAME FOR INDIA'S RAINFALL DEFICIT?

Not yet, despite the headlines. El Nino is a warming of the central and eastern Pacific that shoves the planet's rising, rain-making air eastward and leaves sinking, drying air over India. The American agency NOAA declared an El Nino in the second week of June, and it is expected to strengthen through the winter.

But its hold on the monsoon usually tightens later, across July, August and September. The India Meteorological Department says El Nino played only a limited part in June. The real culprit was the rare pile-up of the other five systems.

WILL THE MONSOON RECOVER IN JULY 2026?

There are signs of life. The rains revived around June 23, reaching Mumbai and edging into central India as the Somali Jet strengthened. Even so, the IMD expects a below-normal season, near 90 per cent of the long-period average, the roughly 50-year rainfall benchmark (1971 to 2020) used to judge a normal monsoon.

The deeper worry is the pattern. A warmer atmosphere holds more water, roughly 7 per cent more for every one degree Celsius of warming. That tips India towards a drought-deluge rhythm, long dry spells broken by sudden, flooding downpours. The monsoon is not disappearing. It is simply becoming far harder to predict.

- Ends