Winter had arrived with a bang and promises to go with one too ' the minimum temperature is expected to dip to 11 degrees Celsius over the weekend, a good three degrees less than the normal average at this time of the year.

That could effectively mean the temperature once again going sub-10 in parts of Calcutta, especially the more open areas on the city fringes. When the Alipore Met office recorded a minimum temperature of 9 degrees Celsius on January 9, the minimum at Ballygunge was 8 degrees and that at Dum Dum 6.6 degrees Celsius.

Having given Calcuttans a feel of real winter, the cold slowly lost its bite. "The temperature had risen quite a bit a couple of days ago and I thought winter was over for good. But since Tuesday night, the chill is back," said Subhadra Gupta, a management student and a resident of Shakespeare Sarani.

The minimum temperature had climbed to 17.4 degrees Celsius on Sunday but since then there has been a steady decline and it touched 12.7 degrees Celsius on Wednesday, comfortably below the normal of 14 degrees Celsius. The maximum temperature went up slightly to reach 24.3 degrees Celsius but it was not too sultry.

"Some parts of north India and parts of east Uttar Pradesh and west Madhya Pradesh are experiencing cold wave conditions. The cold winds from the northern plains are entering Calcutta without any obstruction as the two weather systems that were preventing a drop in temperature have moved away or weakened," said a senior official of the India Meteorological Department the Delhi.