The weather office says that summer might start early, and the heat wave will keep going.
New Delhi: The India Meteorological Department said on Tuesday that daytime temperatures will stay high in the northwest, central, and western parts of India for at least another week. This could mean that summer is coming early, which could hurt the wheat harvest.
Because of rain and snow in the higher parts of Himachal Pradesh, Jammu and Kashmir, and Uttarakhand, the weather in North India was cooler than it was over the weekend. Lahaul, which is in Himachal Pradesh, got 6 mm of snow, Atal tunnel, which is in Kullu, got about 10 cm of snow, Gulmarg, which is in Kashmir, got 10 mm of snow, and Auli, which is in Uttarakhand, got 4 mm of snow.
“It rained and hailed a lot in different parts of Himachal, giving a break from the hot weather. The weather office in Shimla said in a statement that there was about 2 mm of hail. A Met Department official in Srinagar said that the sky will be clear in Kashmir after light snow fell in several parts of the Union Territory.
In the next few days, the weather office expects temperatures in the Konkan region and other parts of western to rise to. It said that the temperature could go up 5 to 11 degrees above normal in parts of Himachal Pradesh and Uttarakhand.
Only in Tamil Nadu, Puducherry, and the Karaikal region has it almost never rained in February. Until February 20, there will not be enough rain in 99% of Punjab, Haryana, and Chandigarh, 97% of Gangetic West Bengal, 99% of Odisha, and 99% of coastal Andhra Pradesh. There will not be enough rain in 100% of east and west Uttar Pradesh, Bihar, Madhya Pradesh, and Rajasthan.
“A western disturbance caused temperatures to drop by 1-2 degrees on Monday, but they are still several degrees above average,” said Naresh Kumar, a senior scientist at the weather bureau. “It hasn’t rained and the sky is clear, so there is a lot of sunlight. Over the Arabian Sea, the anticyclone is also moving around. So, we don’t expect a big break from temperatures that are above average.”
“The surface wind pattern continues to be south-westerly, which brings warm, dry winds,” said Mahesh Palawat, vice president of climate and meteorology at private forecaster Skymet Weather Services. “The anticyclone over the Arabian Sea is still there, and if it doesn’t rain, we don’t think temperatures will drop any more.”
Most cities in the north, centre, and west of the United States had higher-than-normal high temperatures on Tuesday. Delhi’s highest temperature was 31.4 degrees Celsius, which is seven degrees above normal. Gurugram’s was 29.9 degrees Celsius (+5), Panjim’s was 35.3 degrees Celsius (+5), Churu’s was 34 degrees Celsius (+6), Jodhpur’s was 32.5 degrees Celsius (+6), Udaipur’s was 33.9 degrees Celsius (+5), Bikaner’s was 34.1 degrees Celsius (+7), Shimla’s was 20 degrees Celsius (+8), Musso
“Higher daytime temperatures could hurt wheat because it is getting close to its reproductive growth period, which is affected by temperature. When plants are flowering and ripening, a crop’s yield goes down when the temperature is high. There could be similar effects on other standing crops and horticulture, the IMD said in an advisory on Tuesday, asking farmers to choose light irrigation instead of heavy watering.
Jagjit Singh Dalewal, a farmer leader from Faridkot, said that the weather was like it was in 2022, except that it was warmer earlier, which could be bad for the wheat crop. “If these temperatures stay the same in February, yields could drop by up to 40% this time, which would hurt food security and the economy,” he said. In the spring of 2022, heat waves that were out of place caused the harvest of wheat, the main food for the winter, to be smaller.
