Rain brings relief to Delhi residents but leads to traffic jams

Rains and gusty winds gave people a respite from hot and humid weather in the national capital on Saturday, bringing the maximum temperature six degrees down to 29.1 degrees Celsius but disrupted traffic and caused water-logging at several places. The met office said the good weather will continue.

"It will be generally cloudy sky on Sunday. Thundershower with moderate rain may occur at many places in the region," an India Meteorological Department (IMD) official told IANS.

Moderate rains were reported in almost every area of Delhi and the National Capital Region (NCR) on Saturday. The weather office said that the city has received 55 mm rainfall between 11.30 p.m. on Friday and 5.30 p.m. on Saturday.

The Met office said that the maximum and minimum temperatures are likely to hover around 29 and 24 degrees Celsius respectively on Sunday.

Saturday's minimum temperature was recorded at 24.6 degrees Celsius, three notches below the season's average, while the relative humidity oscillated between 89 and 100 per cent.

Friday's maximum temperature settled at 32.7 degree Celsius, two notches below the season's average while minimum temperature was recorded at 26 degrees Celsius, one notch below the season's average.

The rain brought respite to people from the humid atmosphere. Many people came out of their homes to enjoy the showers.

Though the showers made the weather pleasant, it derailed traffic movement across several stretches in the city.

The rains resulted in water-logging in various areas of the national capital resulting in traffic chaos.

According to the Delhi traffic control room, vehicular movement was affected due to water-logging at IGNOU road , on the Outer Ring Road between Rao Tula Ram to IIT Gate, near Sarai Kale Khan, the Sarita Vihar underpass, near a CNG pump on Badarpur-Ashram road, near the Okhla underpass on Badarpur-Ashram route (all south Delhi), under Paharganj flyover in central Delhi and at Loni crossing in east Delhi.

People had a harrowing time because of the traffic jams.

"There was water-logging all around due to which I remained stuck in the jam for over half an hour near Sarita Vihar underpass," Awadhesh Kumar Singh, who works in a multi-national company, told IANS.

Meanwhile Public Works Department (PWD) Minister Satyendar Jain and senior officials of the department on Saturday conducted field inspections to monitor the teams deployed by the department to clear the water logged at vulnerable points across Delhi.

"PWD deployed 202 portable pumps at different locations from wherever the complaints of water-logging were coming. This was in addition to 529 permanent pumps at different locations to take care of the permanent vulnerable locations," Jain said in a statement.

--IANS

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