In addition to the deep winter chill descending on the valley early this season, Kashmiris have to battle frequent load shedding even though authorities claim spending Rs 10 crore per day to keep electric bulbs alight.
Winter’s hallmark, heavy power curtailment, is already in full swing, with un-metered areas facing cuts on two nights a week, and metered areas going without electricity for four hours every day instead of the previous two.
But consumers complain that even this schedule is not followed, and that the Power Development Department (PDD) had resorted to load shedding over and above the curtailment programme.
PDD authorities blame the drop in power generation for the power cuts that have been troubling people. Sources said that the generation in the Lower Jehlum project, having a capacity of 105 MW, had decreased to 22 MWs.
Similarly, the Baglihar power project was said to be generating 120 MWs while the Upper Sindh II is closed for want of repairs for the past two months. The total generation of the upper Sindh project is 105 MWs, and this decreases to 35 MWs during winter.
“The power cuts are not as worrisome as is being portrayed,” the chief engineer, M&RE, Mushtaq Ahmad Shah, says.
He says that consumption had increased manifold because of the decrease in temperatures across the valley.
“Last year, the consumers in the valley consumed 1 crore 35 lakh units of power per day during the month of November, and this year the consumption has touched 1 crore 73 lakh units,” the chief engineer, says
“This year we witnessed a drought like condition and this became the reason that the power generation decreased over the past weeks,” Shah adds
He say that during peak hours, the Kashmir valley needs 1000 MW of power while only 800 MWs are available, that too from all resources.
Shah said that the government was spending an amount of rupees ten crore on purchasing electricity every day as consumers across the valley had resorted to increased use of power.
Add this page to your favorite Social Bookmarking websites
