Mercury rising: Can India tackle the heat and protect lives, livelihoods?

IMD said 2024 was the warmest on record in India since 1901, with the average minimum temperature settling 0.90 degrees Celsius above the long-period average

On Friday, the World Meteorological Organization (WMO) added a new dreadful dark red stripe to represent 2024 as the hottest year in recorded weather history, which started with a cool blue tone. In a social media post, WMO said: “No words, no numbers—just a powerful visual capturing our planet’s warming. The latest update adds a new dark red stripe for 2024—a colour first introduced last year when 2023 shattered all previous records.”

 

WMO has confirmed that 2024 is the warmest year on record, based on six international datasets. The past 10 years have all been in the top 10, in