Temperature to rise till next week under influence of western disturbance

The city woke up to cold and foggy conditions on Thursday morning, when the minimum temperature settled at 7.2 degrees Celsius — down from 9 degrees Celsius on Tuesday. Warmer conditions soon took over, giving way to clear, sunny skies, which pushed the maximum daytime temperature to 20.2 degrees Celsius as against 16.8 degrees Celsius on Tuesday.

While dense to moderate fog will continue to prevail during early morning hours over the next week, official forecasts by the India Meteorological Department (IMD) predict that the minimum temperature will rise to about 10 degrees Celsius till January 25 under the influence of a fresh western disturbance.

“From Friday a fresh weather system will start forming over the Himalayas. There will be a dense cloud cover over entire North India which will trap heat and push up the minimum temperature, which is expected to remain above normal until January 25,” said Kuldip Srivastava, head of the IMD’s regional forecasting centre in Delhi. Meanwhile, the maximum temperature in Gurugram is expected to remain between 20 to 22 degrees Celsius, as per official forecasts.

However, following the passage of this weather system — which is expected to bring fresh snowfall to India’s hilly states — cold, northwesterly winds will once again begin to blow over Delhi-NCR, causing the mercury to dip. As per the IMD’s forecasts, the minimum temperature in Gururgam is expected to dip to as little as six degrees between January 25 and 27, while the maximum temperature is expected to hover around 17 degrees Celsius.

Gurugram’s air quality, meanwhile, settled in the “poor” category on Thursday, with 234 on the CPCB’s daily air quality index bulletin. This was up slightly from 207 the previous day. With wind speeds expected to range between 15 to 20 kmph over the next two days, there will not be any significant deterioration in air quality until early next week. As per the early air quality warning system for Delhi-NCR, “air quality is likely to remain in Poor to lower end of very Poor category on 22.01.2021. The air quality is likely deteriorate marginally but remain in lower end of very Poor category on 23.01.2021.”