Refer to the news story titled "No end in sight to valley's power woes". I appreciate your efforts of highlighting and providing adequate coverage to the issues concerning the ordinary people of the state and that too without compromising on the ethics of journalism. However, with regard to the above mentioned story, certain things need to be clarified. The story says that the Grid sub stations at Mirbazar, Amargarh, Budgam and Alusteng have been allotted on Turnkey Basis to two outside companies in 2007 which is factually incorrect as these projects were allotted to the Firms on 28th and 29th May 2008. Not only that, it goes on to claim that the original date of completion of these Grid sub stations was between 2008 and 2009, which is again erroneous as the aforesaid Grid Stations were originally targeted to be completed by September 2009. The figures quoted in the story regarding the cost of Projects are also not correct. The delay in the completion of these four Grid Sub stations has taken place due to to land row in 2008, Shopian incident in 2009 and five month long unrest during the current year. The Turnkey Firms had in fact demobilized their work-force during recent unrest and once the situation improved on ground the work has restarted and is presently going properly. Moreover the genesis of the present power crisis in the valley does not lie in the infrastructure constraints but in the uncontrolled and rampant use of power by the consumers. The fact is that inspite of the present system constraints the department is supplying much more power (approx. 800 MWs) to the consumers than the domestic agreement load which is of the order of 277 MWs only. As per the practice followed world-over by the utilities the future plans for infrastructure development are always formulated as per the agreement load and the infrastructure presently available in the valley is supplying energy around 60% more than the aforesaid figure. The facts are put straight for the public good.

Chief Engineer
Maintenance and Engineering Wing

Lastupdate on : Sun, 12 Dec 2010 21:30:00 Makkah time
Lastupdate on : Sun, 12 Dec 2010 18:30:00 GMT
Lastupdate on : Mon, 13 Dec 2010 00:00:00 IST