Rainfall patterns over Punjab, Khyber Pakhtunkhwa and Kashmir during El-Nino and La Nina years 1960-2008

This paper investigates the six months (April-September) rainfall patterns over Punjab, Khyber Pakhtunkhwa and Kashmir during El-Nino and La-Nina years from 1960-2008. The major amount of water is attained in Pakistan all through the six month period selected for the study. The month wise and seasonal analysis from April to September has been carried out over the study area to find the probability of above and below normal rainfall during El-Nino and La-Nina years statistically in the 49 years of study. The month wise analysis showed that April and May have 53 % probability of above normal average rainfall and 47 % probability of below normal average rainfall during El-Nino years. The El-Nino years has shown the probability of above normal average rainfall around 26.6 % and the below normal average rainfall probability around 73 % has been observed in June, July and September over the study region. The El-Nino years in August showed above normal rainfall with 33.3 % probability and below normal average rainfall with probability 66.6 %. The La-Nina years with above normal rainfall showed 38.5 % probability in April May, September and 54 % probability in the months of June, July and August. The probability of La-Nina years with below normal average rainfall is 61.1 % in April, May, 46 % in June, July, August and 61.5 % in the month of September. The cumulative seasonal analysis (April-September) has shown that the inadequate amount of rainfall during El-Nino years and excess amount of rainfall during La-Nina years has been experienced over the study domain from 1960-2008. In nutshell the monsoon success and failure can be linked with the El-Nino and La Nina years in Pakistan.