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Four years after the great Mumbai Deluge of July 26,2005, advance doppler Radar,capable of predicting weather every 15 minutes, lies unused. Meanwhile, Weather bureau continues to get it wrong.
The weather forecast for the weekend ran as under:
Saturday, July 4: Heavy to very heavy rainfall
Sunday and Monday: Heavy rainfall, with CM Ashok Chavan appealing to Mumbaikars to stay indoors.
The reality: The forecast was bang-on for Saturday, with 124 mm of rainfall recorded in Colaba and 243.9 mm in Santacruz. Flood-prone areas like Hindmata in Dadar, Milan subway, Lalbaug, Malad and Dahisar went under.
 But on 'heavy rainfall stay at home' forecast days yesterday and Sunday, there was just 3 mm of rainfall, almost dry and sunny days.
Yet again, the weather bureau was off the mark. Yet again, it could've been right, but for a series of unbelievable and unpalatable misses.
Following the great Mumbai deluge of July 26, 2005, the state government commissioned an S-band advanced Doppler radar to detect cloud movement.
This would help predict rainfall in the immediate future and help disaster management teams prepare for evacuations.
Disappearing act
Two months ago, the Doppler finally reached Mumbai. But even though a team of engineers and technicians from China's Beijing Metstar Radar Company Ltd installed it, it cannot be put to work.
The vital electronic connections in the Doppler have to be activated for that, but the team has headed back to China.
It is not known why they disappeared or when they will be back, or if they will even come back before the monsoon ends.
Metstar is a venture of US-based Lockheed Martin Corporation and the Chinese National Huayun Technology Development Corporation, a wholly owned subsidiary of the China Meteorological Administration.
Under utilisation
A retired scientist from the Indian Meteorological Depart-ment (IMD) said, "Apart from the delay in installation, the tender process was also controversial.
The Doppler cannot be utilised to its optimum capacity, as the Software Source Code a crucial component of technology that will allow users to improve or amend it has not been handed over to us."
Complained to PM
A retired ISRO scientist revealed their top brass had complained to the PM about the method of import adopted by IMD.
ISRO said IMD officals had bypassed bids of manufacturers like Bharat Electronics Ltd (BEL) to award the contract to a foreign firm (Metstar) that did not even meet the tender criteria.
In fact, Beijing Metstar is undertaking the installation of 12 more such radars, each costing over Rs 12 crore.
Deputy director general (IMD) R V Sharma said, "The equipment reached Mumbai two months ago.
It took two months to ready it for installation since there was civil work to be done and the weather was windy, making installation difficult. We're waiting for the foreign team to arrive."
The radar has been installed across the top three floors of an 18-storied building in in Navy Nagar, Colaba. The building, which is over 20 years old, had to be strengthened to hold the radar.
In the absence of the radar, the MET department is using satellite imagery to predict rainfall pattern.
Sharma warned that the Doppler would only help assess existing weather patterns every 15 minutes rather than providing long-term forecasts. "It is a now-casting not a forecasting tool," he said.
BEL develops weather radars based on proprietary technology of the Indian Space Research Organisation and Germany's Selex Gematronik GmbH.
WHY DOPPLER?
Doppler weather radars have an edge over other weather radar systems because they can measure the speed of a storm or cyclone.
The radars the government uses right now provide information only on the range of a storm whereas a Doppler provides data to accurately estimate an approaching storm's eye and intensity, fixing its position and predicting its path.
Rs 12 crore
The cost of an S-band advanced Doppler radar | 
