Rajouri, Jan 7: Severe power and water crisis hit several parts of Rajouri and Poonch districts on Friday amid prevailing bad weather conditions, disrupting normal life for the past four days.
A large number of people from different areas of the Rajouri district, especially from the town complained of unscheduled power curtailment which also affected the water supply badly.
“There is a severe power crisis in our area. There has been no electricity in our area since Thursday evening. Even otherwise, the area confronts unscheduled power curtailment but during inclement weather conditions, the situation gets pretty bad in the absence of power,” said Sanjay Sharma, a resident of Gujjar Mandi area of Rajouri.
He said that in several parts of Rajouri town, especially in Bela Colony, Gujjar Mandi, and parts of Ward 7 and Ward 8, the water supply was also affected due to the power crisis.
“There has been almost no supply of water in our areas during the last week. The employees of the concerned department have been telling us that the water level has drastically declined, badly affecting the supply in these areas,” residents of these areas said.
Similar reports of severe power crises were received from other areas of the district.
In a few pockets, the people complained about increased unscheduled power curtailment.
“We have been receiving electricity only for a few hours during the entire day,” they said.
The officials of the Power Development Department (PDD) confirmed that the unscheduled curtailment had increased due to overload.
Superintendent Engineering Hydraulic Circle Rajouri (Jal Shakti Department) J P Singh admitted that there was a severe water crisis in some parts of Rajouri town.
“In some parts of Rajouri town, we have been supplying water using resources, which are too old. Recently due to dry spell, some of these water resources had depleted, causing a water crisis,” he said.
Singh said that the ongoing spell of rains brought some respite as it led to the recharge of groundwater.
“Now our resources have attained their normal level,” he said. “There are still problems in some areas for which we are working on a model of inter-connecting resources.”
Describing unscheduled curtailment of electricity as another reason behind the water crisis, Singh said, “Several water supply schemes are dependent upon electricity due to its water-lifting nature. But curtailment of electricity is on a higher side nowadays and it is affecting the normal functioning of the schemes. It is also a cause of water scarcity in some areas.”
The scenario is not much different in the neighbouring Poonch district.
Both the districts are facing an acute power crisis, however, PDD officials are blaming overloading as the major cause behind it.
“During bad weather conditions, we’re facing large-scale unscheduled curtailment of power. We are hardly receiving power for four to five hours in a day,” the locals allege.
However, PDD officials deny this allegation.
Superintendent Engineer, Power Development Department Sandeep Seth told Greater Kashmir that almost 90 to 95 percent of electricity feeders in the twin districts were functional.
“The power supply is normal except for some minor faults which may happen in any area. Those too are rectified by the field staff immediately,” he said. “There is a huge load on the power system in the twin districts and this is the main cause of the problem being faced by the people.”