The city shivered as the Celsius plunged to 11.2 degrees on Monday.
The minimum temperature was set to slide further on Tuesday. But the cold spell will be disrupted from Wednesday and Christmas is tipped to be slightly warmer, said a Met official.
On Monday, the minimum temperature was four notches below normal. It was also the coldest day in Kolkata since December 28, 2019, when the minimum temperature was 11.1 degrees, according to the Met records.
The readings at the Met office in Alipore go into the record books as the “official” temperature of Kolkata.
But fringe areas, such as Kamarhati in the north and Narendrapur in the south, are usually colder than Alipore by “around half a degree Celsius”, said a Met official.
The Celsius plummeted to the 7-degree range in the districts, prompting the Met office to declare “cold-wave conditions”.
The minimum temperature is expected to go up from Wednesday and is likely to be in the range of 13-14 degrees during Christmas.
“A western disturbance is likely to hit Kashmir over the next 48 hours. As a result, the northwesterly winds will become weaker,” said G.K. Das, director, India Meteorological Department, Kolkata.
“A cyclonic circulation is brewing over Uttar Pradesh. As a result, Wednesday is likely to be partially cloudy in Kolkata. The sky will eventually clear before Christmas. But the minimum temperature is likely to remain over 13 degrees during Christmas,” he said.
Winter in Kolkata is usually marked by multiple spells of chill. The current spell, the first this season that started a week ago, is set to end after Tuesday.
On Monday, the intensity of the northwesterly winds reached their peak.
“I wore a pullover under a jacket. But the ride on the Parama flyover in the morning was freezing,” said Arijit Banik, who rode his bike from his Behala home in southwest Kolkata to Salt Lake office in the northeast.
At 22.4 degrees, the maximum temperature was also four notches below normal.
“The minimum temperature in Srinagar was around -6 degrees on Monday. It was around 3.2 degrees in Delhi and 4.1 degrees in Gaya in Bihar. That explains the sharp slide in Kolkata,” said a Met official.
In the evening, Park Street looked resplendent under a canopy of lights, put up ahead of the Christmas carnival. Every now and then, people wrapped in woollens stopped to take pictures against the colourful background.
Cold wave conditions were prevailing in the districts of south Bengal, the Met office said.
Visitors in woollens take a selfie in Allen Park on Monday evening. Sanat Kr Sinha
In Santiniketan, the mercury dipped to 7.1 degrees Celsius. The minimum temperature was 7.5 and 7.6 in Purulia and Panagarh, respectively.
A deviation of around five degrees from normal prompts the Met office to declare a cold wave.
The sharp slide in the mercury led the district administrations to ask its block offices to reach out to the underprivileged with blankets and warm clothes.
“We have started distributing blankets and warm clothes to the poor people living in remote pockets,” said Rahul Majumdar, district magistrate of Purulia.