The heavy rain and snowfall over the hills of North-West India may abate during the next couple of days but are forecast to return with peaking intensity during the next week.

A US Climate Prediction Centre (CPS) forecast said that Jammu & Kashmir, Himachal Pradesh, Punjab and Uttarakhand would witness wet and rough weather until February 8.

Western disturbance

A similar forecast has been made with respect to extreme South Peninsular India (Tamil Nadu, Kerala and southern parts of Karnataka) for the same period.

While an ‘active’ western disturbance and its offspring circulation are dictating weather over the North-West, a combination of cyclonic circulations is in command in the South.

In the North, the parent western disturbance was on Friday traced lying over North Pakistan and adjoining Jammu & Kashmir, straddling both sides of the international border. Its offspring circulation is mainly responsible for driving the alternating wet, stormy and snowy weather over the hills and the adjoining plains over the North-West.

Rain, snow expected

This circulation lay over North-West Uttar Pradesh on Friday, an India Met Department (IMD) update said, in keeping with the easterly movement of the parent western disturbance. This trough, in turn, spawned a trough that cut through as far to the South as north Madhya Maharashtra and across west Madhya Pradesh.

This meant that all these areas covering the North-West and adjoining Western and Central India came under weather varying from cool to wet and slightly stormy.

During the 24 hours ending Friday morning, rain/snow was reported from most places over Jammu & Kashmir, Himachal Pradesh and Uttarakhand, the IMD update said.

Cold snap

Rain or thundershowers lashed Punjab, Haryana, Chandigarh, Delhi, Uttar Pradesh, east and west Rajasthan, and Madhya Pradesh.

Some of these places may witness these conditions for another day on Saturday even as the causative western disturbance and the offspring cyclone weaken in tandem.

Weakening of associated warmer westerly winds would bring the colder Arctic winds sweeping across Europe and Central and South-West Asia into play over North India as well.

As a result, minimum (night) temperatures are forecast to come down over the next couple of days over the whole of North India, the IMD outlook said.

The cloud cover, too, should dissipate with the western disturbance. This would allow the sun to reach the surface, helping raise day-time temperatures.

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