A truck carries an Kali idol wrapped in a plastic sheet through Central Avenue

Persistent rain continued throughout Friday but the sky is unlikely to play spoilsport during the festival of lights, the Met office has said.

The Alipore Met office recorded over 40mm of rain between Thursday morning and Friday morning. The showers were triggered by a low-pressure area over the north coastal Andhra Pradesh. The system lost some steam and turned into a cyclonic circulation that was located over Odisha on Friday afternoon.

Some parts of East Midnapore and South 24-Parganas received heavy to very heavy rain over the past 24 hours. Digha received 230mm of rain and Contai 120mm.

In Met parlance, heavy rain translates to 60mm-120mm of showers in a day and very heavy rain, 120mm-240mm a day. Tourists were not allowed on Digha’s beaches on Friday.

The weather hampered Diwali shopping in Burrabazar. The stalls selling Lakshmi and Ganesha idols and clay diyas were covered with plastic sheets for most of Friday. Several Kali idols were also wrapped in plastic while being taken to pandals on trucks.

Buyers crowd a sweet shop in Burrabazar

“Yesterday’s low-pressure area over north coastal Andhra Pradesh and adjoining areas of south Odisha and west-central Bay of Bengal has become less marked. A cyclonic circulation lies over Odisha and neighbourhood extending up to 2.1km above the mean sea level with moisture incursion from the Bay of Bengal,” read a Met bulletin issued on Friday afternoon.

“Heavy to very heavy rain occurred at one or two places over the districts of East and West Midnapore, South 24-Parganas and Purulia.”

G.K. Das, the director of IMD Calcutta, said the system had lost some steam and was expected to head towards Bangladesh. “However, it is still leading to a lot of moisture incursion into the state from the Bay of Bengal. Friday’s rain was triggered by this moisture incursion. The sky is going to start clearing from the second half of Saturday. Diwali is likely to be rain free in Calcutta,” he said.

The city was tipped to get heavy rain because of the low-pressure area. A persistent drizzle marked the first half of Thursday. The intensity of the showers increased for a brief spell late in the evening. Intermittent showers continued through the night.

The sky was overcast since Friday morning and it drizzled every now and then. But the volume of rain was lower than Thursday. According to the civic body’s records, New Market, Patuli and Behala had received around 57mm of rain in the past 24 hours till 7pm on Friday. Dhapa got 51mm and Ultadanga 41mm.

The overcast conditions kept the maximum temperature at 25.1 degrees, seven notches below normal.