A defunct streetlight on Fraser Road. Picture by Nagendra Kumar Singh

The ruling JDU seems to be moving steadily towards fulfiling its power promise. Energy probably is the only sector where one has witnessed a change in the past nine years, especially in the last year (November 2013 to November 2014), when supply improved substantially with better distribution.

In his 2012 Independence Day speech, former chief minister Nitish Kumar had pledged to bring improvement in power supply, failing which, he said he would not seek votes in Assembly polls of October-November 2015.

From 600MW of supply in November 2005 to 2,850MW in November 2014, the state has made a steady journey, though slow, in all three aspects of generation, transmission and distribution.

“Supply in the state stood at 600MW when JDU took over the reins in November 2005 but now the volume has gone up to 2,850MW (in October 2014) because of sustained efforts and investment put in by the government,” Manjhi said.

Manjhi, too, reiterated Nitish’s commitment and said: “We will achieve the target in 2015. Our leader former chief minister Nitish Kumarji had taken a ‘Bhishma pledge’ to bring substantial improvement in the power sector by the end of 2015, failing which he would not seek votes in the Assembly elections. There is still one year left. A resolve like this by any political party or their leaders shows commitment and trust in officers and engineers.”

Things, which seemed hollow promises till two or three years ago, now seem to be turning into reality, courtesy steps and measures taken by the government. The state, which was getting 600MW to 700MW in November 2005, is now supplying 2,800MW to 2,900MW in the first week of November 2014.

The state’s supply situation witnessed a tremendous increase in the past two-three years. The state was getting 1,200MW-1,300MW in November 2012, around 1,900MW-2,000MW in November 2013. In November 2014, it got 2,800MW-2,900MW.

Similarly, the state’s transmission capacity has also been raised to 3,500MW in November 2014 to 600MW in 2005. The government has set a target to increase transmission capacity up to 5,000MW by the end of 2015.

The target seems achievable now as the state on November 15, 2014, added 540MW to its power kitty when two units — one each at Barh (660MW) and Muzaffarpur (110MW) — were declared commercially operational by Union power minister Piyush Goyal.

Bihar also started getting supply of 160MW from GMR Kamalanga from August this year under a long-term power purchase agreement of 25 years. The Centre also increased the state’s allocation by 261MW from Dadri plant.

The state hopes to achieve power supply from various sources in the next year that include 660MW from unit II of Barh Stage II, and two units of 195MW each from Muzaffarpur Thermal Power Station.