Cold trap

India recognised cold waves as disaster in 2012. But the country still does not have an effective action plan to mitigate its impact

- RAJIT SENGUPTA

THE COLD is literally biting us, but we have no place to go,” said Soni, shivering despite sitting around a bonfire under the Sarai Kale Khan flyover in Delhi on New Year’s Eve. Her family of eight along with millions of other homeless people in north and northwest India were left freezing in the cold this December as the region experienced one of the longest and most brutal cold waves in living memory (see ‘What caused the unusual freeze’). Over 30 people are reported to have died in Uttar Pradesh due to the extreme event that broke several records.

On December 28, Nagaland received a surprise snowfall after over 40 years and Bihar’s capital city Patna recorded its second coldest day in the decade. Two days later, Delhi recorded its coldest December day when the maximum temperature dipped to 9.4oC. It was 11.4oC below normal. On the last day of the year, Nowgong and Tikamgarh towns of Madhya Pradesh too recorded coldest day temperatures, which were 15.2°C below normal.

With the current cold spell, the number of cold wave incidents this winter is expected to go up in the country, which is already experiencing frequent cold waves in recent years. In 2017, the country recorded 276 cold wave incidents, the highest since 1980 (see ‘A shivering point’). It was 200 the next year, as per Envistats 2019 report, released by the Ministry of Statistics and Programme Implementation. The two years account for nearly half of all the cold wave events recorded between 1980 and 2018. This is a cause for concern as cold wave has lethal impact on human health. During the 39 years till 2018, cold waves have killed 8,169 people. This is almost 200 deaths a year. Another worrying trend is that in 22 of the 39 years, cold waves have killed more people than heat waves in India.