The same picture of the sun scorching during the day and the heat-stricken people looking expectantly at the sky for clouds to bring rain was seen on Saturday too in Dehradun as elsewhere in the Himalayan state of Uttarakhand which has been reeling under a protracted dry spell with the Met department not assuring of rain in the coming days.
In an alert, the Met officers said that the heat wave condition is likely to continue in some parts of the hills in Uttarakhand while the same would continue in the plains, including Dehradun, on Sunday. However, some districts of the state like Uttarkashi, Chamoli, Rudraprayag, Bageshwar and Pithoragarh might experience very light rain on the day.
Dehradun continued to grapple with the sweltering summer heat on Saturday as the mercury hovered in the neighbourhood of 40 degree Celsius. The maximum temperature in the city shot up to 40.2 degree Celsius while it was 40.7 in Pantnagar in Udham Singh Nagar district. In high-altitude Mukteshwar in Nainital district, known as a tourist hotspot for its cool climate, the mercury was above 30 degree Celsius.
The weathermen said that there would be no significant change in the climate in Dehradun for the coming few days and the maximum temperature would continue to hover around 40 degree Celsius. They again said that they were not in a position to say when the heat spell would end. “At least for the coming couple of days, there is not much possibility of rain giving the people respite from the long-continuing heat spell,” said a Met officer on Saturday.
As was the scene for the past few days, the traffic on the principal roads in the city, normally bustling with traffic, thinned considerably during the noon and even afternoon. The main markets located in the city like Paltan Bazaar are drawing significantly lesser crowd during the day time now a days, leaving the traders morose. “We hope that things would look up once it rains. However, we wonder when it would rain,” said a trader.
The summer woe of the people is being compounded by the high level of humidity in the atmosphere which is making the people perspire profusely. Besides, the problem of water scarcity is still plaguing some of the localities of the city with the people complaining of erratic water supply by the civic body when the summer is at its blazing peak.