New Delhi: The much-awaited monsoon finally reached the national capital on Tuesday, bringing cheers to the denizens who were braving intense heat wave for the past week.
"The monsoon has reached Delhi and has also covered almost the entire country," Ajit Tyagi, Director-General of India Meteorological Department (IMD), said.
The normal onset of the annual rains in the city is June 29.
The city will experience showers for the next couple of days, he said, adding conditions were favourable for further advancement of monsoon to Punjab and Haryana.
"But for parts of north-west Rajasthan, Punjab and Haryana, monsoon has covered the entire country," he said.
Various parts of the capital city received rains since on Monday evening, which brought down the temperature to tolerable levels of 25 degree Celsius, the MeT Office said.
The rain gauges of the Weather Office have measures 6.8 mm of showers in the city between 5:30 pm on Monday and 8:30 am on Tuesday.
The city has received over 10 mm of rains in the past three days.
Earlier in the day, the Duty Officer at MeT Safdarjung said that the showers were pre-monsoon rains and monsoon was expected in a day or two.
The weatherman said the minimum temperature dropped by over four degrees to touch 25 degrees Celsius as against Monday's 29.2 degrees.
However, the city experienced 87 per cent humidity in the morning due to the rains.
Though Delhi had missed its June 29 date with monsoon, the city has been receiving showers in the past three days.
The showers have brought respite to Delhiites as they were facing searing heat with maximum touching 44 degrees Celsius for many days coupled with massive power cuts and water shortage.
The temperature at 2:30 pm was 37.4 degree Celsius as against 39.7 degrees on Monday.
However, the humidity rose to 49 per cent as against yesterday's 42 per cent at 2:30 pm.
Last year, the maximum had not crossed 40 degrees in June, with the highest of 38.7 degrees being recorded on the first day of the month.
Similarly, in 2001, the maximum had not crossed the 40-degree mark in the month.
The record for the maximum temperature in June stands at 46.7 degrees on June 17, 1945.