Chandigarh, Dec 22 : The mercury dipped to zero degrees Celsius in Karnal on Saturday as the cold wave sweeping most parts of Haryana and Punjab for over a week continued unabated.
The minimum temperatures in the two states were several notches below the normal.
Karnal in Haryana recorded a low of zero degrees Celsius, seven degrees below the normal and the lowest in the two states, a Meteorological Department official said.
Among other places in Haryana, Hisar, Ambala and Narnaul shivered at 2.7, 4.6 and 2 degrees Celsius respectively, up to five degrees below the normal.
Rohtak, Bhiwani and Sirsa recorded minimum temperatures of 3.8, 5.5 and 3.8 degrees Celsius respectively.
In Punjab, Adampur continued to be the coldest place in the state for the second consecutive day at 0.2 degrees Celsius.
Amritsar, Ludhiana, Patiala, Pathankot, Halwara and Bathinda also braved icy temperatures at 2.2, 1.4, 4.7, 3.1, 2.2 and 2.4 degrees Celsius respectively.
Chandigarh, the joint capital of Haryana and Punjab, recorded a minimum temperature of 4.6 degrees Celsius.
Fog reduced visibility at several places in the two states.
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Bhubaneswar (PTI): The Biju Janata Dal on Saturday suspended six of its MLAs for cross-voting during the recent election to four Rajya Sabha seats from Odisha.
The suspended legislators were Chakramani Kanhar of Baliguda seat, Naba Kishor Mallick of Jayadev constituency, Souvic Biswal of Choudwar-Cuttack, Subasini Jena of Basta, Ramakanta Bhoi of Tirtol and Devi Ranjan Tripathy of Banki, an order by party chief Naveen Patnaik showed.
The suspension decision was taken at the opposition party's Political Affairs Committee (PAC) meeting presided over by Patnaik.
The six MLAs were issued a show-cause notice on March 17.
They submitted their replies on Friday evening, and those were found not satisfactory, said the BJD's chief whip in the Assembly, Pramila Mallik.
The ruling BJP won two of the four Rajya Sabha seats while the opposition BJD and a saffron party-backed Independent candidate bagged one seat each in the biennial polls held last Monday.
While the total number of BJP legislators and Independent MLAs supporting the ruling party was 82 in the 147-member House, the saffron party candidates secured 93 first preference votes, which was 11 more than its strength in the Assembly.
Of these 11 votes, eight were of BJD MLAs and three of Congress legislators, an official had said.
