Avtar Bhat
JAMMU, Dec 8: The increasing cold wave, coupled with 12 to 15 hour power cuts daily has added to the woes of people of Kashmir valley this Winter as Valley is getting 1150 mws of power for its daily use instead of 1900 mws demand.
The power crisis is not confined to the remote villages of Valley but in Srinagar city as well as other towns. The people have to bear the brunt of it. Notwithstanding, the claims of Government to improve the power scenario and supply position in the State this is for the first time when people in some parts of Valley were facing 15 hour power cut in a day generating a lot of public resentment.
One of the causes for the power crisis in the Valley this time is collapsing of Kishanpur-Pampore Transmission Line tower in between Udhampur and Samroli six months back and delay in construction of new transformer in its place.
According to official sources, though the Transmission Line Maintenance Division III of PDD constructed an Emergency Restoration System (ERS) at its place for transmission of power to Valley but it has only one circuit while the transmission line has double circuit which carries load on both sides. Instead of 300 mw power supplied by the transmission line only 130 mw power is transmitted through the ERS at present with the result there is a shortage of 170 mw, sources added.
Citing various reasons for the delay in construction of alternative tower at the site, official sources said that first it took one month in installation of ERS which was brought from Power Grid on rent.
Sources said that many towers of Kishanpur-Pampore Transmission Line destabilized with the construction of National Highway due to land slides and soil erosion but this tower in between Udhampur and Samroli fell completely. Maintaining that installation of tower is a cumbersome task, sources said it took about a month in land acquisition and tower was to be purchased and tenders called for the same which too was a long process. However, the Department decided to bring the tower from Systems and Operations Wing of PDD, Srinagar which had already purchased one but this process also took some time, sources added.
However now the foundation of the tower has been laid and its construction will be completed by this month provided the employees of the division who are without salaries for the last two month don’t go on strike for non payment of salaries to them, sources added.
When contacted the Chief Engineer, M&RE Wing Kashmir, Shahnaz Goni admitted that there is shortage of power in Valley and the Department is constrained to enforce curtailments in metered areas also.
She said that in metered areas there is a curtailment of six hours while in non metered areas it is from eight to 10 hours daily. She said that instead of 1900 Mw of power required for daily consumption, the Valley is getting 1150 mw of power only this time with the result there is a shortage of 750 mw supply.
With such a huge shortage, power crisis have so deepened in the Valley that common masses are left with no alternative but take to streets. The people in various parts of Valley are protesting daily as power curtailment has affected water supply also in those areas where water supply schemes are functioning on power supply only.
People said in some areas transformers have developed snag and they are not being repaired for days together and no one in the Department takes the responsibility to put the system in order.
In a locality in Pahalgam tehsil of Anantnag district, people said that the transformer is dead for about a month while same problem is being faced by the people in Andhu Shangus. In Some localities of Sumbal including Sonawari, Hajan , Hakbara, Sadnaru the water supply has been also affected due to power crisis as water supply schemes in these localities are linked to power supply only. This has generated a lot of public resentment also.
Expressing his concern over the failure of the Government in ensuring better power supply as claimed by it, president PCC and former Minister G A Mir said that Winter was always in Kashmir and it has not come for the first time. “The power problems were during our time too but they were not so grave as at present”, Mir added.
He said “has this been a problem in our Government the PDP leaders would have come out with lanterns in protest but why are they calm at present and do not take effective measures to solve the problems of masses”.
He said entire Valley from Jawahar Tunnel to Uri is in the grip of power crisis and even some areas the people don’t get the two hour power supply.
Expressing concern over power crisis, the people also termed the Government’s failure in realizing the fee from defaulters and said that some consumers have to pay arrears in thousands to the Department but they fail to do so. Even the Department is unable to take action against such defaulters including traders, industrialists, government departments etc.
One fails to understand why the department is not taking action against such defaulters who had to pay even more than Rs 50,000 as charges of electricity, said a local resident of Ganderbal.
They said that this money could be utilized by the Department for building infrastructure and development of the Department. The LT and HT Lines have not been changed for last 40 years and there is a lot of transmission loss which the Department has failed to plug.
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