Earlier, the city never beat Ahmedabad and Vadodara to the mercury chart -- the maximum temperature here rarely crossed the 41 degree mark -- a fact tourism brochure highlighted so prominently till date. But this season has changed it all; an honour Surat would definitely not like to have.

Of all the cities that made it to the temperature charts on satellite televisions, Surat registered the highest temperature.

And with the city already paying heavily in terms of burden on its social infrastructure with the influx of labourers from outside -- an essential fallout of development -- even nature appears to be preparing to strike hard for this manmade phenomenon.

The past few years have seen the mercury rising exceptionally high, but never so early in the season. But what has caused this? From depleting ground water level to rising pollution, and from the fast disappearing land cover to rampant industrialisation, experts cite a number of reasons for the phenomenon.

Most agree that the proliferation of about 350 dyeing and printing houses within a radius of 20 kms in the city and the galloping vehicular population have contributed a lot to the temperature going up.

An industrial association member, requesting anonymity, said that any fuel consuming industry emitted lot of carbon mono-oxide, which after getting trapped in the atmosphere added to the phenomenon. And there were about 700 boilers in a small territory. Besides process houses, even allied industries and chemical units used boilers and so the government should ban new industries, he said.

Head of the Chemistry department of South Gujarat University, K R Desai, sounds a warning. Quoting a study, he claims the maximum temperature could go as high as 50 degrees after five or six years. Though that is the worst case scenario, the projections are not far from reality, he adds, blaming it on depleting green cover and rampant industrialisation in Hazira, Sachin, Pandesara and Palsana areas.

Prof S N Suthar of S V R Engineering College blamed it on pollution, caused by industries and vehicles, felling of trees for construction activity, absence of a recharging canal, diminishing land cover among other factors. Even the sea had receded by more than a couple of kilometres, he pointed out saying earlier sea breeze ensured quick cooling, something that the highrises in the concrete jungle did not allow.

About two decades ago, the ground water level inside the engineering college campus was as high as five feet. Now one has to dig up to 60 feet to strike water, he claimed.

Suggesting corrective measures, Dr J N Patel, his colleague in the Civil Engineering Department, who has worked extensively on Water Resources/Hydraulics, said new societies should be permitted only if they plant a certain number of trees.

To drive home his point, he pointed to the large number of trees inside the campus, which cooled a full one hour ahead of the other areas of the city in the evening.