Rain gods snuff out pareva fire

A DAY after Diwali did not look like Diwali. Weather gods washed the air clean with a stroke of winds and showers.

All the pollutants that crackers loaded the air were sent to the ground again by a breezy rain. It seemed the weather did not allow the city to be as lit up as it would have been. Diyas and candles could not sustain winds. So whatever lights the city had been through various kinds of electricity bulb-networks.

It rained a phenomenal 30 mm on a day after Diwali in Lucknow, which ensured no fireworks and bursting of leftover crackers on Sunday night.

It was all due to an upper air cyclonic circulation that had set in about four days ahead of Diwali and covered almost entire State. Such a weather is rare during Diwali time, but still people in Lucknow had been much more lucky than people in some areas in the State.  Several areas in the State had rain on Diwali day too—like Gorakhpur, Varanasi, or Bahraich.

Lucknow’s 30 mm was the highest rain in the two days in the entire state. ks“I had never seen such a weather in my entire lifetime around Diwali time in Lucknow,” said Shashi Bhushan Agarwal, who is 83.

The sky after the Sunday shower has become clear and the weatherman says that now the upper air cyclonic circulation has become weak. It has  slid to Gorakhpur-Varanasi and Bihar divisions. Therefore, there should not be any rain here. However, he still has forecast isolated rain in some areas of western and eastern UP.

Now, the maximum temperature has started going below the normal. On Sunday, it was 31 and on Saturday it was 32 on both the days it was one degree below the normal. Minimum temperature has been two degrees below normal on both the days—on Sunday it was 16 degrees and on Saturday it was 17 degrees.