Power Crisis in Bihar after Farakka shutdown

PATNA: A major part of Bihar plunged into darkness on Monday following the shutdown of unit-5 of NTPC’s power generating plant at Farakka for annual maintenance. The unit-2 of NTPC’s Talcher power plant is already non-operational.

The power situation is the state is not likely to improve during the coming months as Bihar has not made much progress in the energy sector in the last one decade or so. Power crisis is a perennial story, particularly during summer months.

“The annual maintenance work at Farakka power plant is likely to continue for more than a month. Power generation has declined as a whole in the eastern region,” said an official. As a result, Bihar got only 725 MW from the central sector on Monday as against its normal allocation of over 1600 MW, saidBihar State Electricity Board spokesman H R Pandey.

Bihar’s lone power generating plant at Barauni could generate 55 MW of power on Monday while Bihar’s joint venture power plant at Kanti in Muzaffarpur generated 80 MW. During the last one month, there has been no let-up in the power situation in the state. Rather, the situation has gone from bad to worse.

In protest against the scanty power supply, people have hit the streets in different parts of the state. Bihar is not able to buy power from the neighbouring states as they have no surplus power.

The situation is likely to worsen during the peak summer season. Due to power crisis, people are facing acute water crisis in districts like Banka, Munger, Jamui and others. State government has already expressed its inability to provide power to all in view of the alleged step motherly treatment by the Centre in respect of power supply from the central sector.

According to reports reaching here from districts, power availability is for barely a couple of hours. “We have been accustomed to live without power. We have to pay heavily for getting power from generator,” Ajay Singh, a businessman of Begusarai, said. Similar is the story in Samastipur, Gaya, Bhagalpur, Banka, Darbhanga, Madhubani and other districts.

The situation in the state capital is much better. Patna gets over 300 MW of power to meet its requirement. An equal amount of power goes for essential services like railways, border areas etc. A meagre amount of power is left to meet the needs of remaining parts of the state.