Water, Power crisis worsens in Jammu

• Only 25 water tankers for 72 wards
• one-hour power cut every 2 hours

Jammu, the city of Temples, has been hit by the worst-ever water crisis in the recent times with many areas of the city not getting water supply for days together, while others are getting supply for only a few minutes.
To make things worse, the PHE Department has only 25 water tanks for managing the water supply to 72 wards of the city. There are 12 water tankers for Gandhi Nagar areas and 13 tankers for city areas on other side of River Tawi.
“We are trying our best to supply water to the uncovered areas of the city through water tankers,” Chief Engineer PHE Ashok Gandotra told Kashmir Post. He, however, said that the number of tanks is proving to be insufficient due to increased demand of water.
The old city areas are facing lot of problems as water tankers cannot be sent there.
There are many areas of the city where the water is supplied after 3-4 days, while there are areas in the city where the water is supplied for only a few minutes, which is not sufficient to meet the requirements.
Chinore, Roop Nagar, Bakshi Nagar areas, Janipur, Subash Nagar, Sidhra, Greater Kailash, Narwal and many others are hit by the water crisis.
Officials said that there was already a daily shortfall of 15 Million Gallons (MGD) of water per day, but the prevailing power crisis in Jammu has completely worsened the water scenario.
There is a demand of 65 MGD of water per day, but the available water is only 50 MGD. However, due to frequent power cuts, the officials said that the shortfall has further increased as the department is not able to lift the required quantity of water.
“We need regular power supply to lift the water, and if there is a curtailment of even half an hour, the required quantity of water is not lifted for supply and for filtration,” PHE Chief Engineer said.
It may be mentioned that presently there is frequent power curtailment in Jammu every two hours.

Meanwhile, The power crisis in Jammu region is going to worsen in the coming days as the grid stations are not in a position to supply power as per the increased demand and the infrastructure is unable to sustain the increased load due to rising temperature.
Contrary to the claims of the power minister Sunil Sharma that regular power will be supplied, the Power development Department (PDD) is resorting to one hour power cut every two hours. “The power demand in the coming days is likely to go up in Jammu region and due to less capacity of the grid stations, the crisis will only deepen,” a senior PDD official said. “We have no other option other than to resort to power curtailment of one hour duration every two hours otherwise the entire system will collapse,” said a senior PDD officer.
He said that the infrastructure available with the PDD at present is not well equipped to “sustain the load in peak summer season”. Sources in the PDD also informed that all the grid station supplying power to majority of the areas of Jammu region like Galdni, Janipur, Canal Road, Barn and PouniChack are unable to supply power as per the requirement. Informed sources said the shortfall of power is due to less capacity of the grid stations which are unable to meet the actual power requirement. They said that in some areas the power requirement is 375 Amp but the concerned grid station is supplying 290 Amp for 33 KV line. Similarly, in other areas, the power requirement is 350 Amp but the power supplied by the concerned grid station is 275 Amp.
When contacted, XEn PDD, Anil Gupta said that the power demand has increased manifold and the system is not in a position to sustain the load due to soaring temperature. “Apart from this, there are grid constraints due to which the power crisis has worsened,” said Gupta. The Janipur and Canal grids are the worst hit due to which almost entire Jammu city is facing worst power crisis. There is one hour curtailment every two hours in the metered areas, while in non-metered areas there’s 7 to 8 hour power curtailment.
The deepening power crisis is also adversely affecting water supply in Jammu. The PHE Department cannot lift the required quantity of water due to power outages.