Chandigarh, June 26
Rain gods virtually poured their hearts out this morning, making millions of people across the region extremely happy. Farmers in particular welcomed the rain.
“It appears, the curse of the heat wave is over as the rain gods have taken over”, said Naratta Singh, a farmer of Dhareri Jattan, near Patiala. “ Rain has come at a time when we had almost surrendered to the intense heat wave conditions”, said Mr Joginder Singh, a vegetable grower of Jangpura village, near Banur, to TNS.
Though Met officials say these were pre-monsoon showers, it seems to be an understatement. In fact, it was virtually a heavy downpour for about an hour or so. Whatever it was technically, it has freed millions of people from the scorching heat which has taken away, nearly 50 lives in the past week in Punjab alone. Hundreds have died in other parts of the country because of the heat wave.
Though there were indications last night of the possibility of rainfall because of extreme humid conditions, it happened so suddenly this morning that it turned out to be a pleasant surprise for many who woke up to see their courtyards overflowing with rainwater. It is a good beginning of the monsoon season in Punjab where Met officials had predicted the arrival of regular monsoon by June 29.
The rain came so thick and fast that it made driving on the Chandigarh-Patiala highway extremely difficult. Drivers with weak hearts parked their vehicles on the roadside to wait for the slowing down of the rain. Accumulation of water on the road also contributed in making driving difficult. The force of water on the road was so strong that it made vehicles swerve.
Met officials say that reports of moderate to heavy rainfall have also come in from Uttar Pradesh, Delhi, Haryana and even some parts of Rajasthan. Due to the rain, for the first time the northern power grid, which had remained overstretched because of the high demand for power in the past weeks, had surplus power in its kitty this morning. And the PSEB took full advantage of it. It shut down its unit Number 2 at the Ropar thermal plant to plug the leakage in its boiler and overdrew about 60 lakh units from the northern power grid at a very low rate. The grid makes power available at the lowest rate when it has surplus.
But only half of Punjab got moderate to heavy rainfall today. While, Ropar, Patiala, Hoshiarpur and certain parts of Sangrur had a good rainfall, a large part of the Malwa region, including Mansa,Moga, Muktsar, Faridkot and Majha region, remained dry.
There was an instant fall to the tune of 800 MW in the demand for power in the state immediately after the start of the rain. And the PSEB’s power system managers enhanced power supply to rural and urban areas reducing the duration of power cuts. However, in the evening, the demand for power again started shooting up. As the closure of the generation of power from the Nathpa Jakhari project has also hit Punjab, because it avails 500 MW of power from it, the PSEB today made an arrangement with the Gujarat State Power Board to buy about 300 MW of power from it to compensate for the shortfall.
Immediately after the rain, farmers rushed to their fields with tractors to prepare for the transplantation of paddy.
Meanwhile, the inflow of water in the Sutlej in Himachal Pradesh has increased to 50,000 cusecs. Partially it is due to the rainfall and partially due to the rapid melting of glaciers.
