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NT Bureau
Chennai, Feb 17:

TOP VIEW : The view from the Ripon Buildings is a bit cloudy. We are not talking politics here.

WARMING OR WARNING? Rain drops can move you to poetry, or perhaps a prayer if you believe in global warming alarmists.

        Suddenly 'global warming' is on everyone's lip. And Chennaiites too had a reason to mouth that as a sudden burst of heavy rain caught them off guard and left them soaking, and perhaps thinking, too this morning.

        The unseasonal rain - showers in February in these parts are a bit like Karunanidhi without his yellow towel. Hard to sight these days, that is - must have brought a new chill to the spine of most. The chill has got nothing to do with the nip in the air. It maybe more due to the fear of the unknown. The whole world has been talking about global warming, warning of strange climatic happenings. And it was certainly quaint and queer to see the skies open out in February.

        The sight of morning sky - dark and dire as if a giant helmet had been placed over the city, perhaps in deference to the new rule that is to come into force shortly - was good enough to convince that something was amiss.

        But the weather office did not talk in esoteric terms. The weather report stuck to the usual trade cliches. 'The morning showers were due to 'upper air trough'. The weather in Chennai will remain generally cloudy with one or two spells of shower or thundershower till Monday. The department also predicted isolated rain or thundershower over Tamilnadu, Puducherry, Andhra Pradesh and South Kerala.

        Global warming? Well, the weather bureau did not use the term in its report. But the people were busy mouthing them. And most of them sounded alarmist. They seemed as if apocalypse was waiting just for the sponsors to happen.

        Between the laconic met office and the alarmist public, the truth of February rains lay somewhere in between. But it is under a cloud for the now while people trudged through the streets that looked as if they had been visited by the great deluge itself. A few drops certainly make for a mighty ocean of sorts at least Chennai's roads.

        So the preparation for global warming should be, er, better roads!