Patna: Deputy chief minister Samrat Choudhary on Wednesday exhorted meteorologists of the India Meteorological Department (IMD) to enhance the accuracy level of their predictions. He said the state and central govts were ready to provide them all possible help needed to improve the services of IMD.
“Development of related infrastructure is crucial for making accurate forecasting, which has improved though in recent times. We want this to improve further, and are ready to assist you all in this endeavour,” said Chaudhary while addressing a stakeholders’ workshop on weather and climate services, organised here to commemorate the 150th foundation year of the IMD.
Choudhary further said, the IMD has come a long way and it should be commended for its near exact predictions that were highly useful in the fields of agriculture and disaster management. “Weather forecast plays an important role in the lives of farmers, who can plan and prepare their agricultural activities depending upon the predictions made by the weathermen,” he said, adding the meteorological and disaster departments were complementary to each other and the former can help the latter in managing disasters and saving precious lives and property.
The deputy CM also said that meteorological report played an important role in various areas, including plane take-off and landing, which depended on favourable weather conditions and accurate forecasting.
On the plan of the state govt to increase green cover, Choudhary said they have planned to plant around one lakh saplings along the JP Ganga Path in order to develop and popularise the area as eco-tourism. The number of saplings will be 1.5 times the total trees at the Patna zoo at present, he added.
Mritunjaya Mahapatra, director general of IMD and Ashish Kumar, head of Meteorological Centre (Patna) also spoke on the occasion and talked about weather monitoring and forecasting services of IMD for the state. Scientist Anand Shankar proposed a vote of thanks. The second edition of ‘Aditya’, a technical Hindi magazine was also released on the occasion.