Wait until dark

class="keywordtourl" href="https://indianexpress.com/article/research/raman-singh-profile-5487118/" class="">Raman Singh complained to Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and Union Power Minister P.M. Sayeed. BJP workers were out on the streets. The Congress retaliated by blaming the state government.

In November 2004, the Centre had withdrawn 288 mw from Chhattisgarh’s share and allocated it to Madhya Pradesh, also BJP-ruled but a chronic power patient. Chhattisgarh had protested then too, on procedural rather than political grounds.

Ajit Jogi, former Congress chief minister, is clear about the Raman Singh government’s incompetence. ‘‘Remember how fiercely I used to fight for the power share, not sparing even Madhya Pradesh,’’ he says. Till 2003, the state was selling power to Gujarat, Delhi, Madhya Pradesh, Karnataka. Some 35 ferro alloy units — a power-intensive sector — that had closed down when the state was formed were revived. Electricity was not a problem. So what went wrong? There’s a one-word answer: complacency.

If the earlier Congress government failed to plan for the future, the successor BJP regime did no better. Demand has grown from 900 mw in 2001-2002 to 2,100 mw but capacity has remained static at 1,400 mw A cycle tube factory in Raipur: living by the meter

IF the earlier Congress government failed to plan for the future, the successor BJP regime did no better. Demand has grown from 900 mw in 2001-2002 to 2,100 mw but capacity has remained static at 1,400 mw.

The increase in demand can be attributed to new industrial units, and the granting of nearly 50,000 pump connections. The state government invited investment but made no matching plans for power. It says it’s spent Rs 730 crore over four years on new sub-stations, tranmission lines. Once the lights go off — as they do for six hours every day in the average Chhatishgarhi home — you know it wasn’t enough.

Predicts Chhattisgarh State Electricity Board (CSEB) chairman Rajib Ranjan, ‘‘For another two years at least, the state will have to live with the power crisis. More power cuts are on the cards,’’ He pins hopes on private power investors and captive power producers easing CSEB’s burden.

IT’S not merely an urban issue. Low voltage and irregular power supply have ruined the rabi crop in Mahasamund, Raipur, Durg, Damtari, Bilaspur and Raigarh. Pumps can’t be used and irrigation is a non-starter. In April, an irate mob attacked the CSEB office in Durg’s Dalli-Rajaraha area. Farmers from the district recently met the chief minister and energy secretary.

Industry is also sulking. Chhattisgarh has been luring investors, promising them uninterrupted power. But over the past month, production figures for the iron and steel sector have fallen 20-25 per cent. This despite the fact that major iron and steel units have captive power units or generators. Nearly 20,000 workers in Urla and Siltara industrial areas in Raipur sit idle day after day. Their factories are silent, as is the local power station.

‘‘There is a daily loss of Rs 50 to 70 crore. If the supply doesn’t improve, several new industrial units will become unviable,’’ says Mahesh Kakkar, president, Chhattisgarh Udyog Mahasangh. Kakkar’s own cycle unit gets only six hours of power a day. As he puts it, ‘‘It takes a minimum of two hours to light-up the boiler for the stream. And in the next four hours, I can’t do enough job work to meet my production cost.’’ Some industrialists have begun migration to Orissa.

IN 2002, the Chhattisgarh government approved two new hydel projects in Korba, each of 500 mw capacity. Work has begun on only one. Three other projects have been on the drawing board for four years. Obviously neither the Congress nor the BJP government took deadlines seriously.

Some critics see the delay as deliberate. Says one, ‘‘It benefits private producers like the Jindals, who sell their power to the state at a higher cost, Rs 3.50 per per unit.’’ The CSEB’s monthly power bill is Rs 80 crore, and the major supplier is the Jindal Group.

Ironically, revenue collection is down from Rs 220 crore a month a year ago to Rs 200 crore now. The Board is set to lose its status as the only profit-making SEB.

Meanwhile the CSEB chairman talks of making Chhattisgarh a power-surplus state once again, ‘‘by 2011-2012’’. Others talk of power reforms and unbundling CSEB. The average citizen only gropes in the dark for those damned candles.