The India Meteorological Department announced on 15 October 2026 that the southwest monsoon had completely withdrawn from the country and that the northeast monsoon had begun. Northeast monsoon activity was reported over Kerala, Tamil Nadu, Puducherry, Karaikal, coastal Andhra Pradesh, south interior Karnataka and Rayalaseema. Kerala was forecast to get heavy to very heavy rain from Thursday, 15 October, until 21 October, and the IMD issued an orange alert, meaning a possibility of very heavy rainfall, for districts including Idukki, Kottayam, Ernakulam and Pathanamthitta. Thunderstorms with lightning and gusty winds of 40 to 50 kilometres per hour were also possible at isolated places in Kerala and Lakshadweep on Thursday and Friday.
The argument for taking the alerts seriously is based on the intensity of the forecast. An orange alert in Kerala covers very heavy rain of 12 to 20 centimetres, which is 120 to 200 millimetres, in 24 hours, and the article that reported the forecast listed Thiruvananthapuram, Kollam, Alappuzha, Idukki, Kottayam, Ernakulam and Pathanamthitta as districts at that level. Yellow alerts for rainfall of 7 to 11 centimetres in 24 hours covered Thrissur, Palakkad, Malappuram, Kozhikode, Wayanad, Kannur and Kasaragod, so every district of the state was under some level of warning. The hills and low-lying districts of central Kerala are prone to landslides and flooding when rain falls at that rate, and an alert for six days gives the administration time to prepare. The shift to the northeast monsoon also means that Tamil Nadu and the coastal areas of Andhra Pradesh enter their main rainy season.
The counter-argument is that the alerts expired on 21 October and a forecast is not a measure of what actually happened. Reports of the number of districts under the orange alert varied between the headline, which mentioned four, and the full list of seven, so the details changed as the forecast was updated. The reports did not give the rainfall totals for the southwest monsoon season in Kerala or in India, so it is not possible to say from it whether the season ended with a surplus or deficit. A withdrawal declaration is also a technical decision based on the winds and humidity over the country, and in some years rain continues in parts of the country after the declaration. Weather alerts are also colour-coded for a day-by-day forecast and are revised as the system moves.
The change of season matters for the south, where the northeast monsoon provides the main rainfall for Tamil Nadu and parts of Andhra Pradesh and Karnataka. It affects farm operations such as sowing for the rabi season and the filling of reservoirs, and it brings the risk of floods in cities such as Chennai that have suffered heavily in the past. For the country, the end of the southwest monsoon means that the main monsoon-driven season for crops is over, and attention shifts to the storage of water and the winter crop.
The monsoon has changed over from the southwest to the northeast. Kerala was braced for a week of heavy rain, and the coming weeks will show how active the northeast monsoon will be.