mercury rises in north-west; fresh snowfall in Kshmir

New Delhi, Feb 23 (UNI) The mercury today continued its rising trend in the north-west India while the upper reaches in the Kashmir valley experienced fresh snowfall.

Plains in the valley, including Srinagar city, had rains coupled with intermittent light snowfall since morning. The fresh snowfall resulted in a considerable drop in the day temperature while night temperature was above normal in all parts of the valley.

The Jammu and Kashmir Government has sanctioned Rs 7,00,000 in favour of seven persons who were killed in recent heaviest snowfall in 20 years in south Kashmir.

A weakened Western Disturbance over Jammu and Kashmir brought mild intermittent snowfall at isolated places in the tribal districts of Himachal Pradesh for the third consecutive day today.

Shimla town's minimum and maximum temperature fell to 6.7 and 14.5 degrees respectively as against 7.6 and 18.4 degrees recorded yesterday.

The minimum tempratures stayed two degrees to six degrees Celsius above normal in Punjab and Haryana.

The weather Office has predicted light to moderate rain or snow at many places in Himachal Pradesh and light to moderate rain or thundershowers at isolated places in Punjab and Haryana during the next 48 hours.

The mercury in Delhi also shot up to 15.2 degrees, four degrees above normal, promising a warm weekend for its denizens after last week's chill.

In Punjab, the temperature witnessed a steep rise to 15.4 degree celsius from yesterday's 12.0 degrees due to cloudy weather conditions.

The night temperature in the holy city of Amritsar moved to 8.8 degree from yesterday's 6.8 degree celsius, while at Halwara Airforce station near Ludhiana it again increased to 13.2 degree from yesterday's 11.6 degree.

Mainly dry weather prevailed in the western part of the country.

Temperature also rose in Madhya Pradesh where most places recorded a low of 14-17 degrees. Indore recorded a low of 17 degrees, followed by Bhopal (15), Satna (15), Jabalpur (14), Gwalior (13), Raisen (9), Ujjain (9) and Rewa (9).

In the east, Patna today recorded a minimum of 12.6 degrees. In Arunachal Pradesh, altogether six houses have been partially damaged at Luguthang by an avalanche while the Thingbu circle under Tawang district has been badly affected by heavy snowfall since the past several days.

The weather in Manipur today improved with slight rise in the mercury with a maximum of 24.8 degrees.

Mainly dry weather will prevail over Assam, Meghalaya, Nagaland, Manipur, Mizoram, Tripura, Gangetic West Bengal, Orissa, Jharkhand, Bihar.

Towards the South, dry weather prevailed over Karnataka. Mainly dry weather will prevail over Konkan, Goa, Madhya Maharashtra, Marathwada, Telangana, Rayalaseema, interior Tamil Nadu, Karnataka and Kerala with likeliness of rains or thundershowers at isolated places in coastal Andhra Pradesh, coastal Tamil Nadu, Andaman and Nicobar Islands and Lakshadweep.

UNI team AKJ AT HS1915