Skymet Weekly Intelligence: Monsoon Deficit Near 14%, Heavy Eastern Rains Raise Coal And Power Concerns

Key Takeaways:

• India's seasonal monsoon rainfall deficit is near 14%, compared with around 13% at the end of July.
• Weather systems in the Bay of Bengal continue to concentrate heavy rainfall over eastern and adjoining central India while several deficient regions remain subdued.
• 45 coal-fired power plants have critically low coal inventories, with heavy rain disrupting mining and transportation across Odisha, Jharkhand and Chhattisgarh.
• The first week of September is expected to remain uneven, with eastern India staying wetter while Interior Peninsular India sees no immediate broad-based revival.
• Forecast Validity: Next 7 Days

August 2026 has ended with monsoon deficit near 14% with an increasingly uneven rainfall pattern. Repeated weather systems from the BoB continue to produce intense rainfall over a relatively narrow eastern corridor, even as large parts of the country remain deficient.

The emerging risk now extends beyond rainfall and agriculture. Heavy rain across the eastern coal-producing and transport corridor has disrupted coal movement at a time when inventories at 45 thermal power plants have fallen to critically low levels. This creates a direct link between weather, coal logistics and short-term electricity-market conditions as India enters September.

The defining question is therefore not simply whether India is receiving heavy rain. It is where that rain is falling, whether it is reducing the drought, and how repeated deluges over the same corridor are affecting critical infrastructure and energy supply.

Monsoon Deficit Persists

India is ending August with a seasonal rainfall deficit of nearly 14%, slightly worse than the 13% recorded at the end of July. While parts of eastern India have seen repeated spells of intense rain, areas such as Andhra Pradesh, Bihar, Punjab and parts of Northeast India continue to struggle with inadequate rainfall.

Another well-marked low-pressure area is bringing heavy rain across eastern and adjoining central India, but much of the southern peninsula remains relatively quiet. This uneven spread of rain remains the bigger concern — some regions are dealing with too much rain, while many of the areas that need it most are still waiting for a meaningful recovery.

Heavy Rain and Drought Coexisting?

Heavy rain and drought can exist at the same time because monsoon performance depends not just on how much rain falls, but where and how consistently it falls. Successive Bay systems have brought intense rain to Odisha, Jharkhand, Chhattisgarh, West Bengal, Bihar and adjoining Central India, triggering flooding and waterlogging in some areas.

At the same time, large parts of the southern peninsula, northwestern India and other rain-deficient regions are missing these recovery spells. A few days of torrential rain over already wet areas cannot make up for weeks of poor rainfall elsewhere. This is the contradiction of Monsoon 2026: floods in some regions, while the country as a whole remains rainfall deficient.

Eastern Rain Corridor Remains The Focus

Weather systems in the Bay of Bengal (BoB) continue to direct the strongest monsoon activity towards the same eastern corridor. Odisha, Gangetic West Bengal, Jharkhand, Bihar and Chhattisgarh remain the main focus, with rain extending towards East Madhya Pradesh and East Uttar Pradesh.

Repeated heavy spells over these areas raise the risk of waterlogging, flooding and disruption to roads, railways, mining and industrial activity. Meanwhile, much of Interior Peninsular India remains subdued, reinforcing the uneven pattern — too much rain in some regions, while areas needing recovery continue to miss out.

El Niño Remains Strongly East-Weighted

El Niño remains strongly east-weighted, with Niño-3.4 at +1.8°C, Niño-1+2 at +3.2°C, Niño-4 near 0.0°C, and the May–July RONI at +1.0°C. With a greater than 90% probability of a very strong El Niño during autumn and winter, the pattern remains a concern for late-monsoon support, although weather systems in the Bay of Bengal can still bring intense regional rainfall within a nationally deficient season.

Energy: Rainfall Risk Affecting Coal-Supply

The weather-energy relationship has become materially more important during the final days of August.

As of 25 August, 45 coal-fired power plants had inventories below 25% of requirement or insufficient stocks for three days of generation, compared with 31 plants at the end of July. Forty of these plants depend on domestic coal.

Total coal stocks at power plants fell by around 19% from the end of July to 30.95 million tonnes, equivalent to roughly ten days of operational supply.

Heavy rainfall has disrupted mining and coal transportation across Odisha, Jharkhand and Chhattisgarh—the same broad corridor now facing another spell of intense monsoon rainfall. Some power stations reportedly received only around half of their required coal rakes, while maintenance at certain plants has been deferred.

This marks an important change from the previous week's risk assessment. Weather-related disruption to coal logistics is no longer merely a possibility; stress is now visible in plant-level inventories.

Rain, Coal and Evening Electricity Prices

Heavy rain can disrupt coal mining, railway loading and rake movement, reducing coal supplies to thermal power plants. This becomes particularly important after sunset, when solar generation drops while electricity demand can remain high, increasing dependence on thermal and other dispatchable power.

For 31 August, the IEX Day-Ahead Market averaged ₹5.387/kWh, down from ₹7.300/kWh a week earlier, with cleared volume rising to around 183,730 MWh. While market conditions have improved, weak coal receipts combined with weather disruptions and evening power demand remain an operational concern, though this does not indicate a nationwide electricity shortage.

Agriculture And Water: Distribution Matters More Than National Totals

With kharif sowing largely complete, crop risk now depends more on soil moisture, dry-spell duration, irrigation availability and rainfall distribution than acreage alone. Heavy rain over eastern India may improve local water availability, but it cannot ease moisture stress in distant rainfall-deficient regions.

Rain-fed crops are especially sensitive to how rainfall is distributed through the season. A few extreme spells cannot provide the same benefit as regular, well-distributed rain, which is why localized heavy rainfall does not mean India's broader drought risk has disappeared.

Monsoon And Public Health

Repeated monsoon rain is also raising public-health concerns. A recent assessment found rising monsoon-fever risk across 186 of 209 cities, highlighting how persistent rain, high humidity, stagnant water and water contamination can create favourable conditions for seasonal illnesses.

The Week Ahead

The first week of September is likely to retain the same highly uneven monsoon character seen during August.

Eastern and adjoining central India will remain the main focus for significant rainfall, with Odisha, Chhattisgarh, Jharkhand, Bihar, Gangetic West Bengal, East Madhya Pradesh and East Uttar Pradesh among the areas requiring close monitoring.

Interior Peninsular India is unlikely to receive a comparable broad-based revival immediately. Another North Bay circulation may subsequently renew rainfall over parts of eastern India, although its eventual inland track remains uncertain.

The national rainfall deficit, currently near 14%, may shrink marginally by around 1-2 percentage points during the first ten days of September before potentially making an incremental rise thereafter.

And now there is a third dimension. The same rain that is failing to end the broader drought is disrupting the coal and logistics corridor that supports India's thermal power system.

The larger message from this monsoon is the growing importance of rainfall distribution over rainfall totals. From agriculture and water availability to coal movement and power markets, the impact increasingly depends on where intense rain is concentrated and which regions continue to remain dry. Monsoon 2026 is showing that the same season can create scarcity and disruption at the same time.