The Met department on Friday forecast another year of near normal monsoon for the country, predicting 96 per cent rains over the four-month period of June-September. The forecast is likely to bring cheer to farmers as well as the industry as good rainfall is extremely crucial in agriculture dependent India to boost growth in a slowing economy. The department said that the south-west monsoons this season would be 96 per cent of the Long Period Average (LPA) with a model error of 5 per cent. The country's rice and wheat growers heavily depend on the south-west monsoon as about 60 per cent of arable land is not irrigated.

Some meteorologists were expecting the monsoon rain to be normal as the El Nino factor, a phenomena of warming of the Central Pacific ocean, was unlikely to develop. Higher than normal temperatures in several parts of the country have also led some weather scientists to forecast better rains.

However, the weather office said dynamical and statistical models indicate equal probabilities for weak La Nina and El Nino neutral conditions which could still swing the forecast toward wetter or drier weather. IMD will update the forecast in June as a part of the second stage of predictions.

The weather office also took into account experimental forecasts prepared by the Indian Institute of Tropical Meteorology, Indian Institute of Science, Space Applications Centre, National Aerospace Laboratories, Centre for Mathematical Modelling and Computer Simulation and National Centre for Medium Range Weather Forecasting, a statement from the Met department said.