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| Doforestation needed to ensure power supply | | | Nirbhay Jammual
Power supply to various areas in Jammu,especially the posh Gandhi Nagar belt,remained snapped for about 22 hours between Friday Afternoon and Saturday morning.The reason was high velocity winds and a brief spell of rain.With power supply off drinking water supply system also collapsed and people had to go without fresh water for over 14 hours.Power engineers took refuge under the storm whenever they were asked to explain the reason for the prolonged shutdown.What about the shutdowns,that too frequent,during fair weather.If anybody has ventured to ask the power engineers about it they take shelter under the established departmental jargon by saying it has been the result of fault on some transmission lines.
Well neither any punishment for these faults.Power engineers possibly do not know that in tennis if a player commits double fault in service he earns a minus point.Should the same rule be applied in case of engineers whenever consumers complain of repeated faults and not the mere double fault.The recent change in the guard of the Power Development Department (PDD) is said to have worsened the power scenario.The new Chief Engineer is either not informed about the problem that the distribution system in Jammu is faced with or he prefers to feign ignorance.Whatever may be the reason he is not willing to be accessible on telephone.If by chance he picks up the phone he disarms the caller by informing him that he or she has dialled a wrong number.He acts like a police officer who does not know which cases were piling up in the police stations.
Well critics of the erratic power supply should not blame the power engineers.Why ? Those who are ready to question me should read this statement of a senior power engineer when I asked him about the reason of distribution system developing faults after faults.He says "we cannot do anything as far as the entire Gandhi Nagar belt is concerned."Explaining it he says "the entire Gandhi Nagar area has a thicker forest belt than Bhatindi or Manda.Whenever there is storm or heavy rain these tall trees totter down snapping the power supply lines."He is quick to add "see the thick tree cover in the green belt area, and near the mainstop where supply lines are buried under the thick foliage and heavy branches."The engineer is a nice guy who giggles when reminded of one solution.He is being informed that residents of Gandhi Nagar can have either green forest cover or electricity because the two cannot coexist.He agrees saying that for the "fragile power supply system trees are its enemy because man has no power to control storms and rain."
The Government,as such,has to evolve a mechanism of either ridding the Gandhi Nagar belt of the thick tree cover or make the transmission system strong enough to bear the burden of fallen tree branches.The better scheme would be to lay underground supply lines which may be very costly beyond the reach of state resources.Even upgrading the transmission lines could be a costly affair.The best way is to order immediate felling of trees.However the project of tree cutting need to be assigned to the PDD because its engineers and supervisers can ensure that transmission lines were not damaged.For this the PDD requires separate funds.Let Governor create history by strengthening the power supply system failing which enhancing the capacity of the Gladini grid station was not going to be the remedy. |
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