By Swati Khandelwal/CNBC-TV18

The Met Department says the monsoon will be near normal.  A badly bruised government is praying for rain.

The government can heave a sigh of relief at least for now. The monsoon is expected to be near normal and will be sufficient for sowing rice, wheat, and oilseeds. India's farm output has been a drag in recent years, and depends on the strength of the monsoon, which usually runs from June to September. Normal monsoon forecast could help ease the food shortage, which has stoked inflation to a three-year high.

Kapil Sibal, Minister Science and Technology, said, “IMD's forcast for 2008 south-west monsoon season is that rainfall as a whole is likely to be near normal between June to September, which is 96 to 104 mm.”

Meanwhile, the Monsoon Department has changed its statistical model to predict rainfall accurately.

Explaining this change, Sibal said, “A study conducted showed that in the North-Western parts, Central India, Northern part and Western India our statistical model worked properly. But when we came to Peninsula India, i.e. North-East, we realized that our statistical model did not run properly. This year, we decided that to use the statistical model in areas where it has proven to work and will apply the dynamic model for the Southern Peninsula. We will then correlate the statistical and dynamic model for the Northeast and Southern Peninsula and make appropriate corrections. This is one thing we have done which is different from last year.”