Untimely rains coupled with high speed winds lashed Chhattisgarh continuously for the third day on Sunday, making life miserable for both common man in general and farmers in particular.
Notably, till a couple of days ago, temperature in many parts of the State, including State capital Raipur, was rising ominously and even in mid-April, it was touching 42 degree Celsius mark. However, from Friday afternoon onward, high speed winds followed by drizzle and at some places hailstones hit life hard even as it brought the temperature down, giving much relief to people from the sweltering heat.
The continuous dust storm hit hard both crops and power lines plunging many parts of state in to darkness for hours. The State capital is facing the fury of storm depriving it power supply regularly from April 13 when a powerful gale hit Raipur and surrounding districts crippling the supply as uprooted trees fell on overhead supply lines resulting in fire incidents at more than a dozen places in Chhattisgarh.
According to weather expert JK Ingle, weather has taken turn twice within a week due disturbance over Bay of Bengal forming a trough from Western Uttar Pradesh to Andhra Pradesh via Chhattisgarh.
State capital Raipur, its surrounding districts Durg, Rajnandgaon and even southern most part of Chhattisgarh, Bastar experienced storms blowing at 50 km speed coupled with rains also on Saturday night. However, there was no report of damage so far except disruption in power supply plunging many parts of Raipur into darkness. During day time on Sunday the weather remained pleasant but in the evening thunderstorm coupled with rains hit capital as well as many parts of the state again.
According to Weather department during the last 24 hours Jagdalpur experienced 30 mm rain, Saraipali 20 mm, Pamgarh, Mungeli, Kondagaon, Sarangarh, Durg, Bilaspur 10 mm each while state capital received more than 10 mm rains during last 36 hours.
Due to the rain temperature came down sharply with mercury plunging to 20 degree Celsius in Raipur, 23 in Bilaspur and 20 degree in Jagdalpur. However, the untimely rains caused wide spread damage to crops of vegetables as also pulses and oilseeds just ahead their harvesting. The rains have also damaged paddy lying in open in a number of paddy procurement centres, detailed report on which is yet to come.