Trend analysis of rainfall, rainy days and drought: a case study of Ghataprabha River Basin, India

Abstract

Drought is a recurring natural hazard, which has the potential to alter the ecological conditions of a region. A deficit in rainfall and a decrease in the number of rainy days induce the meteorological drought. The present study considered the nonparametric Mann–Kendall to investigate annual and seasonal rainfall (rainy-day) trend and meteorological drought trends over the Ghataprabha River Basin, India. A significant number of moderate and severe droughts were observed over the study period, and the eastern portion of the basin possessed the highest number of drought frequency (20–35 No.) in all the time scales of SPI. Results of trend analysis revealed that the stations having significant negative SPI trends are increasing with the SPI time scale, which could lead to the droughts of higher duration and severity. From the study, it was also noted that the negative trend of SPI was moving from the western portion of the basin to the eastern side, as the SPI time scale increases. Comparison between rainfall trend and rainy-day trend with SPI trend revealed high (ranging from 0.91 to 0.97) and moderate (0.67–0.7) correlation, respectively. This indicates that the rainfall trend will capture the SPI trends effectively. The findings of this work could be useful for a better understanding of regional drought trends and also establish effective water resources management policies over the basin.