Bone-chilling cold intensified across North India today, providing no respite to people soaked in the yuletide spirit even as the extreme weather claimed three more lives, taking the country-wide death toll this winter to 131.

The fresh deaths were reported overnight from Uttar Pradesh, which has so far accounted for 91 fatalities.

Delhiites woke up to the coldest Christmas in five years today as the mercury plunged to the season's lowest of 2.9 degrees Celsius, five degrees below normal.

“While today's minimum broke yesterday's record of 3.3 degrees Celsius, the maximum was recorded at 20.3 degrees Celsius, one degree below average,” a Met department official said.

Noting that the temperature may go down further with the winter chill here to stay for another couple of days, he said the prediction for tomorrow suggests that minimum temperature could even touch 2 degrees Celsius and the maximum would be around 21 degrees Celsius.

However, there was good news for air travellers as the weatherman predicted a clear sky with “shallow” fog in the morning without chances of rain.

The coldest day of the season so far in Delhi was December 24 when the minimum dropped to 3.3 degrees Celsius.

In December last year, the minimum had come down to 5.2 degrees Celsius on the 22nd of the month. In the past decade, the lowest minimum for the month was recorded on December 12, 2005 when the mercury recorded 3.3 degrees Celsius while the highest maximum was 28.4 degrees on December 15, 2003.

The record for the lowest minimum for the month of December is 1.1 degree Celsius recorded on the 26th of the month in 1945 and the highest maximum was 29.3 degrees on third of the month in 1987.

Hisar in Haryana and Amritsar in Punjab recorded minimum temperatures of 0 deg C and 0.6 deg C respectively, both readings being a few notches below normal.

Narnaul recorded a low of 0.5 deg C, down by five degrees, while the minimum at Ambala settled at 3 deg C, down by four notches, the local weather office said.

In Kashmir Valley, Srinagar recorded a minimum temperature of minus 4.8 degrees, which was the coldest night in the city so far this season.

The tourist resort of Gulmarg recorded a low of minus 9.8 deg C, while in the remote Leh district of Ladakh region, the minimum temperature dropped by a degree to settle at minus 16.2 deg C, the MeT Dept said.

In the desert State of Rajasthan, Churu continued to remain the coldest place registering a minimum of minus 1.4 deg C, followed by Pilani at 0.3 degrees.

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