Saturday 12th Jul, 2025
The state of Jammu Kashmir loses around 70% electric energy to Transmission and Distribution (T&D) losses. To prevent the losses, the state government had introduced Energy Accounting of power stations in 2012, but so far the plan has not materialized. Under Energy Accounting system, the officer responsible for distribution of electricity was to be made accountable for the units supplied from a particular feeder. The experts believe the meters installed at grid or sub stations are not up to the mark. Most of them are unreliable and need regular testing, but reliability tests are being conducted rarely. Despite repeated directions of the Union government to increase the revenue collection, some of the most vital measures including energy accounting of grid stations are still restricted to papers only. It is imperative to make proper inventory, as how electricity is being used after it leaves the grid and power stations to curb T&D losses, but the same is still in oblivion. Despite investing crores in revamping the power sector, especially in the capital cities, PDD has failed to prepare any Disaster Management (DM) system in case of major breakdown in the electricity supply. The Comptroller and Auditor General (CAG) had revealed that no disaster management setup existed in the state for immediate restoration of transmission system in the event of any major electricity failure or fault. Further out of 54 Grid Sub-Stations, generator backup is available in only 37 sub-stations. Pertinently, Union Power Ministry has been regularly asking the state to bring down power purchase bill and T&D losses, which were currently around 60 to 65 per cent and initiate other reforms. To add insult to injury the Jammu and Kashmir government has again shelved the much hyped insulation project that could have curtailed the T&D losses to a large extent. It has been reliably learnt that there has been no progress over the plan which the government mooted in the recent past seeking insulation of cables supplying power to JK households. But the government has to wake up and do the needful as soon as possible.