Kashmir’s Power Woes: Admin shrugs off complaints as residents face long hours of outages

The people in Kashmir Valley continue to face unscheduled and prolonged power cuts, even as the Kashmir Power Development Corporation Limited (KPDCL) on Monday issued much anticipated curtailment schedule by announcing an eight-hour and four-hour power cut in non-metered and metered areas respectively, to tackle the electricity crisis.

According to reports, many parts in Srinagar and elsewhere continue to reel under darkness due to unscheduled and prolonged power cuts at a time when mercury has plunged after fresh snowfall and incessant rains. The frequent power cuts have been reported from both metered and non-metered areas.

“The power scenario is deteriorating with every passing day. With winter yet to arrive, we can only hope the administration wakes up and provides some relief to the common people,” Bashir Ahmad, a resident of Harwan told.

Like Ahmad, Zubair Ahmad Khan of Hawal also complained of erratic power supply. “The electricity is playing hide and seek over the last fortnight. There’s no schedule in place. We’re suffering despite paying our electricity bills on time,” Khan added.

However, the administration rejected the complaints of the consumers and said that there was no power crisis in the Valley.

Principal Secretary of Power Development Department (PDD) H Rajesh Prasad told Kashmir Observer that the additional power supply that was purchased from the Uttar Pradesh government has been distributed and a new arrangement is active. “I disagree, there is no power crisis. We have put the new arrangement but there might be local issues somewhere. The concerned authorities will check it out,” Prasad said.

He further said that demand and supply of electricity is dynamic and goes up and down. “There is always a gap between demand and supply. There might be some minor gaps. We will check it out,” he added. Notably, the authorities on Monday issued a fresh power curtailment schedule for the Kashmir Valley.

According to the schedule, the KPDCL has stated that there will be 4.5 hours power curtailment in metered areas on a daily basis. It stated that the curtailment of 1 hour 30 minutes will be in three shifts–morning, afternoon and evening.

For non-metered areas, the department has fixed a daily 8-hour curtailment in electricity.