A low formed over the northwest Bay on Saturday afternoon, prompting the Met Office yesterday to advise the maritime ports of Chittagong, Cox’s Bazar, Mongla and Payra to hoist the local cautionary signal no. 3.

As the Bay became increasingly choppy, the Met Office asked fishing boats and trawlers out in the north Bay to move close to the coast, negotiate the sea cautiously, and not to venture into the deep sea until further notice.

This is the second low in the northwest Bay in a month. The earlier low moved away towards the Odisha coast in India as a land pressure put a seal on the rain over Bangladesh despite the monsoon remaining fairly active over the country. But the monsoon has become less active over Bangladesh with a second low in the Bay in quick succession, Met Office sources said.

It is the reason behind slowing down of rainfall over the country. During the past 24 hours ending at 6am yesterday, Dhaka city recorded only 2mm of rain, while Srimangal, the tea valley in the northeast recorded the highest of 89mm, followed by 54mm in Rangamati, 28mm in Rangpur and 1mm in Bhola.

Meanwhile, people left the city to meet their near and dear ones to celebrate the religious festival of Eid-ul-Azha and suffered a lot amid the hot weather in trains, buses and other vehicles. But their return to the city since Saturday was greeted by another day of heat and humidity as Dhaka temperatures rose to 33.7 Degrees Celsius. It worsened their plight with family members under a relative humidity of 93 percent without any but a skimpy shower over the city’s Agargaon area only where the Met Office is located to record the 02mm rain.

It was all due to a less active monsoon over the country, said the met sources. They forecast, however, isolated showers across the country but rains and winds in many places of the Chattogram Division today.