Power promises

It is election time and every party among other things is promising improvement in power supply, and some are promising hundred free units of electricity to consumers. The parties are within their right to make such promises. But it is being hoped that whosoever forms the government will pay due attention towards the power sector.

Jammu and Kashmir despite having enormous potential for power generation faces serious power crisis from time to time. Subsequently, the scheduled and unscheduled power cuts are being witnessed.

The scenario becomes worse during the winter months. The gap between the power supply and the demand is getting widened, and low power generation leads to serious problems. The concerned authorities have to buy power from outside and even then the demand is not met during the peak hours of the evening.

There is a need to establish more hydro-electric power projects in the state sector. If J&K had set up enough projects, not only would have it been self sufficient in power but also selling power to other states to strengthen the economy. The casual approach for a long time had its adverse effects on the power scenario. Not only the consumers suffer during power crisis but even the Power Development Department (PDD) is under tremendous pressure to provide better supply.

The consumers say when they pay the bills regularly in time and have been covered through smart meters, why are they facing the shortage. The authorities on the other side say that the low power generation at local level, non payment of bills  by some consumers, and power theft by some people complicate things.

According to the authorities J&K inherited power debt of Rs 28,000 crores which has been repaid. It is being hoped now that after repaying of the power debt, the authorities are able to buy adequate power from outside whenever the need arises so that there are no power crisis.

Buying power is a compulsion till the local power generation reaches to the self sufficiency stage. The incomplete power projects have to be completed speedily. There should not be any delay in their completion. More power projects must be set up and work on those started speedily.