A system over the Bay of Bengal triggered heavy rain in Calcutta on Friday, leaving several roads waterlogged and traffic crawling.

According to the Met forecast, heavy rain is not ruled out in Calcutta on Saturday.

Based on figures obtained from the Kolkata Municipal Corporation pumping stations, Jodhpur Park and neighbouring Jadavpur were among the wettest in the city, recording 90mm of rain between noon and 3pm.

Manikltala got 67mm in the same time, Ballygunge got 51mm, Thanthania 48mm and Kalighat 38mm.

Between 8.30pm on Thursday and 8.30pm on Friday, the Met office recorded 35mm rain kn Alipore, which serves as the official recordkeeper for Calcutta.

Several roads in north and central Calcutta, like Central Avenue, MG Road and Amherst Street, were underwater for most of Friday.

Students were seen wading in the waterlogged roads on their way back home.

At the intersection of Central Avenue and MG Road, the water almost touched the doors of the cars.

Several lanes in and around Jadavpur were also waterlogged.

“A cyclonic circulation lies over north Bay of Bengal at 5.8km above mean sea level. Thursday’s low-pressure area over north Bangladesh and the neighbourhood was over northern parts of West Bengal and adjoining areas of northeast Jharkhand on Friday morning. It is likely to move nearly westwards towards Jharkhand,” said a Met bulletin on Friday.

“The monsoon trough at mean sea level now passes through Bikaner, Sikar,
Orai, Churk, Dehri, centre of low pressure area and thence east-southeastwards to northeast Bay of Bengal,” it added.

The cyclonic circulation is the main catalyst for the showers. The monsoon currents are now active over Gangetic Bengal, said a Met official.

On Saturday, heavy to very heavy rainfall (7-20cm) is likely in South 24-Parganas, East and West Midnapore, Bankura, East and West Burdwan districts and heavy rain (7-11cm) is likely in the remaining districts of south Bengal.

On Sunday, heavy to very heavy rainfall is likely in Purulia, Birbhum and West Burdwan districts and heavy rainfall is likely in Jhargram, East and West Midnapore, South 24-Parganas, East Burdwan and Bankura.

The consistent showers in August have narrowed the monsoon deficit for Calcutta.

The cumulative deficit for Calcutta now stands at around 19 per cent, said a Met official.

A New Alipore resident booked an app cab to reach his office near Jeevan Deep on Chowringhee Road on Friday afternoon. It took him over an hour to reach work, compared to the usual 35 minutes.

“The cars were not moving on several roads,” he said.