The first monsoon forecast has been released by the India Meteorological Department (IMD) on April 15. It’s been projected that India is expected to experience above-normal monsoon rainfall in 2025.
The IMD defines rainfall in the range of 105-110% of the LPA as “above-average”.
The Centre for Monitoring Indian Economy (CMIE) database has compiled data on IMD’s first monsoon forecast from 2001 onwards. In the 24 monsoon seasons up to 2024, the first rainfall forecast differed from the season’s actual performance by more than five percentage points in 14 years. IMD’s forecast comes with an error margin of up to five percent. This gives an accuracy of 42% to IMD’s first forecasts, which is worse than the statistical probability of predicting a coin toss (0.5 or 50%).
