Light snowfall followed by rain and sleet brought cheers to tourists in Shimla on Thursday but forced the closure of vehicular traffic on over 200 roads in the upper reaches of Himachal Pradesh.
While the snowfall cut off the remote Dodra Kwar subdivision in Shimla district from the rest of the state, 177 reads in Lahaul and Spiti, five in Chamba, and two each in Kangra and Kullu were closed for vehicular traffic. Isolated parts of Shimla, Kangra, Kullu, Chamba and Lahaul and Spiti districts witnessed light snowfall. Kothi in Kullu received 14 cm of snow followed by Khadrala and Shillaro with 10 and 7.5 cm each. Kufri and Gondla each received 4 cm of snow while Kalpa recorded 3 cm of snowfall.
The Jakhu hill in the capital town was covered under a thin layer of snow but intermittent rains washed it off. Keylong in the tribal Lahaul and Spiti district recorded the lowest minimum temperature in the state at minus 6.3 degrees Celsius, followed by Narkanda at minus 2.8 degrees Celsius, Kalpa at minus 2.6 degrees Celsius, Kufri minus 1.2 degrees Celsius, Dalhousie minus 0.1 degrees Celsius.
Manali and Shimla shivered at 0.4 degrees Celsius and 1.4 degrees Celsius respectively. The tourism sector in Shimla is hoping that snowfall would lead to tourists making a beeline to the queen of hills during the weekend.
According to the local weather station, light to moderate snowfall in mid and higher hills is predicted on January 13 and rains in lower hills from January 14 to January 18. A prolonged dry spell in the state has resulted in a 20 to 25 per cent loss to wheat crops and vegetable cultivation in rainfed areas which constitute 75 per cent of the total cultivable land in Himachal Pradesh as the state recorded almost 100 per cent deficit rains in December 2022.
With isolated rains and snow in some places, the rain deficit from January 1 to January 12 has been reduced to 76 per cent as the region received 4.9 mm average rains against the normal rainfall of 22.9 mm.
