August Rain in Varanasi Tops 410 mm; IMD Keeps Friday on Yellow Alert

August rain in Varanasi has already crossed 410 millimetres, with four days of the month still left, and the India Meteorological Department has kept Friday, 28 August 2026, on a yellow alert for heavy rain at some places. Thursday itself came in two spells and added 40 millimetres. The last three days have put 240 millimetres on the city total. June-to-date rain stands at 591.9 millimetres.

This is a month wrap, not a retread of Tuesday’s single-day burst. The seasonal numbers now sit above last year’s entire Sawan. In 2025, Sawan logged 374.4 millimetres in 30 days. This August has already gone past that mark with four days remaining. The agriculture department has said August has broken a 10-year record. That 10-year claim is the agri department’s, not an IMD table published with this briefing.

IMD senior scientist Dr Atul Kumar Singh of the Uttar Pradesh Regional Meteorological Centre has said the next one to two days are likely to stay similar. He has also said August could approach 450 millimetres. That 450 millimetres is his possibility, not a recorded total. The recorded August figure on the present clock is more than 410 millimetres.

Friday’s yellow alert is the operational line. Heavy rain is possible at some places. A low-pressure area sits near southern Uttar Pradesh and Purvanchal. A trough runs Amritsar–Chandigarh–Muzaffarnagar. Those two features are the weather map Dr Singh attached to the yellow.

A sister clock in the same scientist’s Thursday briefing puts the monsoon quota at 577.2 millimetres in 55 days against a 70-day normal. Onset this year was 1 July, against a usual date around 20 June. The season started late and has now stacked rain into August. Wednesday was actually dry: maximum 34°C, minimum 25.1°C, wind 11 km/h. Thursday’s 40 millimetres in two spells is the return of rain after that dry day, not a continuation of an unbroken hourly soak.

The last-three-days 240 millimetres is the short burst that has lifted August above 410 millimetres. June-to-date 591.9 millimetres is a longer clock, from 1 June, and sits beside — not inside — the 55-day monsoon-quota figure of 577.2 millimetres. Those two season totals use different start points. They are not to be added, and one is not a correction of the other.

Yellow on Friday means heavy rain at some places, not a citywide red. Dr Singh’s one-to-two-day similar outlook is why the alert is being carried into Raksha Bandhan morning rather than lifted after Thursday’s 40 millimetres. The trough from Amritsar through Chandigarh to Muzaffarnagar, and the low near southern Uttar Pradesh and Purvanchal, are the systems he named. No other system was attached to this briefing.

The agri department’s 10-year August record is a departmental claim on the month as it now stands, with four days left. IMD’s public number for August so far remains more than 410 millimetres. The 450 millimetres line is still only Dr Singh’s possibility if the next days behave as he has said they might.

Wednesday’s dry 34°C / 25.1°C / 11 km/h reading is the pause inside the month. Thursday’s two-spell 40 millimetres is the resume. Friday’s yellow is the watch. Last Sawan’s 374.4 millimetres in 30 days is the comparison that makes this August already heavier, with the month not yet closed.

August in Varanasi is past 410 millimetres, past last Sawan’s 374.4 millimetres, and, on Dr Singh’s possibility, could still approach 450 millimetres. What is on the record this morning is the 410-plus, the 40 millimetres on Thursday, the 240 millimetres in three days, the 591.9 millimetres from June, the 577.2 millimetres in 55 monsoon days, and a yellow alert for Friday.