Cold wave in North India to ease: Met dept

    New Delhi: There seems to be no let-up in severe cold wave sweeping across northern India, with mercury plummeting below two degrees Celsius. In the national capital, the minimum temperature was recorded at 1.6 degrees Celsius at 6:10 am (IST). While on Sunday, it was recorded as coldest winter, with a minimum temperature of 0.2 degrees Celsius breaking a 70-year-old record. B Lal, Director General Meteorology, said by Tuesday itself people will find a drastic change in the weather conditions becoming warm with each passing day. He said it was the northwesterly disturbance that had caused the fall in temperatures but now it is going to shift towards eastern Uttar Pradesh.

    "Coming days, as I said in the beginning, Delhi and surrounding regions and the northern plains also, the cold wave conditions will become less and less. By tomorrow, you will find a significant change. In the eastern side also, it will decrease by day after tomorrow," Lal said. According to the Meteorological Department officials, visibility was recorded at 800 meters and a layer of haze enveloped the capital in the early hours, this morning. Thick fog in the plains disrupted the rail services as many trains were late and trains reaching Delhi were delayed. However, air traffic at the Palam Airport, which had been disrupted over the last few days, was normal in the morning. The runway visibility was 1,500 meters which was clear enough for flights to operate on time. As a precautionary measure, the Delhi Government has also declared a three-day holiday for young children in the primary schools to save them from the biting cold. But thousands of homeless people who live on the streets of New Delhi and other cities in northern India have been hard hit by the bitter cold spell, which has killed more than 100 people in the area since December.

   The coldest place in the north India plains was Churu district in the desert state of Rajasthan where the temperature touched minus 3 degrees Celsius. The weather office said heavy snow in the Himalayas and northwesterly winds had pushed down temperatures in the northern plains, below normal. It was the capital's coldest weather since the temperature fell to minus 0.6 Celsius in 1935, the weather office said. In Agra, home to the Taj Mahal, the temperature fell below freezing point to minus 1 Celsius, and in Lucknow, capital of Uttar Pradesh, India's most populous state, homeless people huddled round bonfires lit by civic and voluntary organizations.

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