Winter chill to intensify in next 48 hours

"The same weather conditions will continue to prevail for two to three more days at least. Temperature will hover around 11 and 10 degrees and chances of temperature falling a little below 10 degrees in the city cannot be ruled out," a senior official of Alipore weather office said.

The Met office further forecasted that a cold wave will sweep across the four districts East and West Burdwan, Birbhum and Purulia in the next couple of days where temperature has already dipped below 10 degrees. Asansol recorded 8.2, Sriniketan 7.2 and Purulia 7 degrees celsius respectively. The five districts that will have 'Cold Day' effect in the next two days will be South and North Dinajpur, Malda, Murshidabad and Nadia district. In fact, the temperature during the day will also be on the lower side in the entire state with the maximum temperature hovering around 20 degrees in most of the places. The other places in the state also kept up with the cold spell. Popular tourist destination Digha in East Midnapore registered 11.9 degrees, Krishnanagar was 8.8, and Berhampore was 9 degrees.

North Bengal also registered temperatures below 10 degrees on Friday. While temperatures in Cooch Behar, Malda, Jalpaiguri were 9.7, 9.3 and 9.0 respectively, Darjeeling shivered at 0 degree.

However, dense fog will continue to prevail in North Bengal for the next few days with transport service expected to be affected. Train services to North Bengal have been badly affected, thanks to the fog.

According to a weather official, it has been on two occasions since 2010 that temperatures in Kolkata had gone below 10 degrees. On January 12, 2011 temperature was 9.6, while on January 9, 2013 temperature had dipped to a record low of 9 degrees. Last year, the lowest temperature in the city was 11. 2 degrees recorded on January 15.