Pune shivers on coldest December day in six years as mercury drops to 7.4 degrees

As the temperature drops, the demand for winter wear is increasing in the city. (Express: Pavan Khengre)

Pune recorded the coldest day of this winter season on Friday, when minimum temperatures plummeted to 7.4 degrees Celsius, 3 degrees below normal. The last time the city had experienced such a low night temperature in December was in 2012. Friday was largely breezy, which made the day temperatures drop 3.2 degrees Celsius below normal, while the maximum temperature was 25.4 degrees Celsius.

Besides Pune, many cities in north Maharashtra, including Nashik and Jalgaon, experienced severe cold conditions under the influence of cold northerly winds. As was the case in Pune, severe cold returned to parts of Jalgaon for the first time after 2012, stated IMD data. At 5.7 degrees Celsius, nearly 7 degrees below normal, Nagpur remained the coldest city in the state on Friday.

The India Meteorological Department said cold wave conditions continued to prevail over most parts of north and western India, including Jammu and Kashmir, Uttarakhand, Punjab, Himachal Pradesh, Rajasthan, Haryana, Delhi, Bihar, Jharkhand, Uttar Pradesh, Saurashtra, Kutch and west Madhya Pradesh.

“There is a trough extending from southeast Madhya Pradesh, covering south interior Karnataka, Vidarbha, Marathwada. In addition, the chill factor is due to cold winds blowing over northern Maharashtra,” said a senior official from IMD, Mumbai. IMD has warned that cold wave conditions will prevail in some pockets of Vidarbha on Saturday. The minimum temperatures over the rest of the areas would hover between 8 degrees and 10 degrees Celsius till December 31, said IMD officials.