'Severe' heat wave abates, says IMD even as fatalities inch towards 100

New Delhi: India’s heatwave toll nears the hundred mark on Saturday with the addition of four security personnel on poll duty, who died due to heatstroke even as the India Meteorological Department announced abatement of “severe heat wave”, but cautioned that heat wave would continue in large parts north and central India.

The number of heatwave days vary between 8-14 days in May in almost the entire north and central India and Odisha with east Rajasthan topping the list with 14 such days last month followed by Haryana, Punjab, Delhi and Uttar Pradesh, as per the IMD.

While no severe heat conditions (temperature above 47 degrees Celsius) had been observed on Saturday, heat waves (more than 45 degrees Celsius) were seen in parts of Punjab, north west Rajasthan, north Madhya Pradesh and in isolated pockets over south Haryana-Delhi, west Uttar Pradesh, west Jharkhand and central Chhattisgarh, an IMD official said.

A fall in maximum temperatures, up to three degrees Celsius has been observed over Rajasthan, Haryana-Delhi and West Uttar Pradesh and up to four degrees Celsius in east Uttar Pradesh.

Heat waves with 45-46 degrees Celsius temperatures have been experienced by people in isolated pockets in Punjab, northwest Rajasthan, north Madhya Pradesh, Vidarbha and Chhattisgarh and west Jharkhand.

A dust storm in the afternoon brought some respite to Delhi and its surrounding areas, which were in the grip of a severe heatwave in the last few days. The maximum temperature settled at just above 44 degrees Celsius.

As millions cast their votes in the last phase of the Lok Sabha polls, braving the heat, four security personnel deployed for the Lok Sabha elections died due to heatstroke over the last one week in Bihar's Rohtas district, an official said on Saturday.

They add to a list of over 90 people who were killed in the unforgiving summer heat in the last few weeks. Most of the deaths happened in western Odisha, Uttar Pradesh, Bihar and Rajasthan.

Scorching summer and heat waves are not new in India, but their intensity is increasing with duration getting prolonged.

A recent analysis by the Centre for Science and Environment shows heat stress is not just about rising temperatures, but a deadly combination of air temperature, land surface temperature and relative humidity that leads to acute thermal discomfort.

Even if there is a variation in air temperatures across climatic zones with some parts recording even a decline, the other two factors – relative humidity and land surface temperature - combine to enhance discomfort and heat-related disease burden.

Meanwhile, in a separate exercise, the Union Health Ministry says India has recorded 56 deaths from 24,849 suspected cases of heat stroke between March and May.

The data, however, doesn’t include figures from Uttar Pradesh, Bihar and Delhi, and the final count will be higher.

Between May 1 and 30, as many as 19,189 suspected heat stroke cases including 46 deaths were reported in the country, the ministry says, quoting data compiled by the National Centre for Disease Control.