'Efforts on to bring Dulhasti and Uri Hydro proj to J&K'

Jammu and Kashmir government today said efforts are on for the transfer of Dulhasti and Uri Hydro power projects from NHPC in a bid to put the state on the path of "fiscal autonomy"
In a written reply to questions in the state Assembly, Deputy Chief Minister Nirmal Singh said, who holds the power portfolio, said a number of measures have been taken to overcome power crisis in the state.
The transfer of power projects is an important part of the developmental agenda of the PDP-BJP coalition government.
"As stated in the Agenda of the Alliance, in order to address the real source of Jammu and Kashmir's fiscal problem and pave way for making the state fiscally autonomous, the state government will work with the Union government to, inter-alia, explore modalities for transfer of Dulhasti and Uri hydro power projects to Jammu and Kashmir as suggested by the Rangarajan Committee report and the round table reports," he said.

To work out the present cost of the power projects of NHPC in the state, he said an independent consultant was hired by the State Power Development Corporation (SPDCL) Limited and based on the documents available in public domain like audited balance sheets and Central Electricity Regulatory Commission (CERC) orders, the consultant had calculated the present cost of Salal, Uri-I, Dalhasti, Uri-II, Sewa-II, Nimo Bazgo and Chutak HEPs.
The report of the consultant is under examination in the SPDC, Singh said.

Acknowledging that Jammu and Kashmir was one of the highest Transmission and Distribution as well as AT&C loss- making state in the country, he said the department concerned has been able to bring down the AT&C losses from 72.68 per cent in 2011-12 to about 59 per cent in 2015-16.

To plug these losses and bring them to national level for the betterment of common consumers, various flagship programmes are currently under execution or in the pipeline, the Deputy Chief Minister said, adding these flagship programmes mainly focus on upgradation and strengthening of the T&D system in the state.
Once these flagship programmes are implemented, the consumers will get a reliable and quality power supply and AT&C losses will also be reduced to 15 per cent by 2019-20, he said.
The Centre has approved an amount of Rs 11,358 crores
under Prime Minister's reconstruction and rehabilitation programme for augmentation of distribution system in the state, he said.

He said 100 per cent metering is the top-most priority of the department.
At present across the state, 55 per cent of consumers are metered and 8,19,835 are unmetered consumers, mostly in domestic sector.
The deputy Chief Minister said the power supply to the consumers is being provided as per curtailment scheme, at an average cut of three hours and eight hours per day in metered and non-metered areas respectively.
At times, department is compelled to resort to unscheduled power cuts also because of use of load in excess of the agreement by the consumers, he said.
He said the power department is also in the process of implementing energy efficiency measures under which consumers will be provided set of five LED bulbs at subsidised rates for replacing existing incandescent lamps.

This will be a considerable step in energy saving which ultimately will reduce the shortfall in supply and provide reliable power supply, he said.