As the cold wave tightened its grip on northern India, the air quality dipped to the 'severe' category on the last day of the year, according to the Central Pollution Control Board data on Sunday.
According to the IMD, a Yellow Warning has been issued of 'Dense Fog' very likely to occur at one or two places over the districts of Koraput, Malkangiri, Nawarangpur, Kalahandi, Sonepur, Bolangir, Sambalpur, Jharsuguda, Bargarh, Sundargarh, Deogarh and Ganjam.
As the icy chill prevailed in the North Indian belt, the India Metrological Department (IMD) on Saturday recorded minimum temperatures in the range of 7-10°C over most parts of Punjab, Haryana, Chandigarh, UP and north Rajasthan.
The winter chill continues to grip North India, as cities such as Prayagraj in Uttar Pradesh, Jaipur in Rajasthan and Sambalpur in Odisha faced cold waves, engulfed in dense fog on Saturday morning.
Cold weather conditions along with moderate fog prevailed in many regions of the Delhi-NCR on Saturday. The minimum temperature recorded in the national capital was 10.7 degrees Celsius.
According to the IMD, "The visibility recorded (at 1730 hours IST of today)(<=500 m): Uttarakhand: Pantnagar-200; Punjab: Ludhiana-200; Haryana: Bhivani-500; Delhi: Safdarjung-500; UP: Bareilly, Bahraich and Prayagraj-200 each, Aligarh, Lucknow, Gorakhpur, Fursatganj, Babatpur & Sultanpu
Fog is categorised as "very dense" when the visibility goes below 50 metres. On the other hand, if the visibility is between 51 to 200 metres, it is considered "dense" fog and "moderate" fog prevails when the visibility is between 201 and 500 meters.
An INSAT (Indian National Satellite System) imagery released by the Met department on Thursday depicted fog hovering over the North India region.
The satellite image taken at 1430 hrs (IST), showed a fog layer continuing over Punjab, Haryana, extreme north Rajasthan, Uttar Pradesh, and north
UPSRTC officials said that buses should not operate in case of poor visibility due to fog. The corporation also advised operators to park buses at safe locations and wait until visibility improves.