Climate
Kolkata has a subtropical climate, with summer monsoons. The annual mean temperature is 26.8 °C (80 °F); monthly mean temperatures range from 19 °C to 30 °C (67 °F to 86 °F) and maximum temperatures can often exceed 40 °C (104 °F) during May-June. Winter tends to last from Mid-November to early-February, with the lowest temperatures hovering in the 12 °C — 14 °C range during December and January. The highest recorded temperature is 43 °C (111 °F) and the lowest is 5 °C (41 °F).
Monsoon is the most notable phenomenon in the climate of the city. Maximum rainfall occurs during the monsoon in August (306 mm) and the average annual total is 1,582 mm. Early morning mists and evening smog occur often due to temperature inversions. Summer is dominated by strong southwesterly monsoon winds. The city's total duration of sunshine is 2,528 hours per annum, with the maximum insolation occurring in March. Often during early summer, spells of thunderstorm and heavy rains lashes the city, bringing some relief from the heat and intolerable humidity. These thunderstorms are locally known as Kalbaishakhi (Nor-wester). According to a United Nations Development Programme report, its wind and cyclone zone is "very high damage risk".
Read more about this topic: Geography Of Kolkata
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“Nobody is so constituted as to be able to live everywhere and anywhere; and he who has great duties to perform, which lay claim to all his strength, has, in this respect, a very limited choice. The influence of climate upon the bodily functions ... extends so far, that a blunder in the choice of locality and climate is able not only to alienate a man from his actual duty, but also to withhold it from him altogether, so that he never even comes face to face with it.”
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