Patna, March 29: The state has been living through a nightmarish experience over the past 10 days owing to the acute power crisis. It has thrown the lives of people of Bihar off the track. The reason — Bihar is receiving half of its scheduled allocation from the central sector.

Residents of the capital may not be facing the brunt of the power crunch but the people in other parts of the state have been paying a heavy price for no fault of theirs.

The state has been reeling under a severe power crisis for past 10 days after some of the National Thermal Power Corporation (NTPC) plants developed snag in some of their plants at Talcher, Kahalgaon and Farakka.

The state received 900MW of electricity from the central sector against its scheduled allocation of 1722MW apart from 40 to 50MW from its own Barauni thermal power station. After meeting the 350MW requirement for essential services and another 350MW for Patna, the state electricity board is left with just 250MW to distribute across the entire state. It may be noted that state requires a maximum of 2,500MW.

Gaya

Acute power crisis has not only adversely affected the normal lifestyle of people but also the ice cream and soft drink business.

“Owing to shortage of power, using generator is the only option to save ice cream products from melting,” said Chandan Kumar, who runs running an ice cream parlour near Peer Mansoor. Shortage of power had also affected the income of ice cream trolley vendors.

A vendor, Pradeep, said the trolley has to charge for 12 hours before it maintains temperature for 12 hours. However, the trolley could not charge up owing to prolonged power cuts. Vendors cannot take out the trolleys before 1pm instead of the usual 10am.

“Normal earnings of up to Rs 400 per day have dipped to between Rs 150 and Rs 200,” Pradeep said.

Muzaffarpur

Life in the biggest city of north Bihar is no different despite being a commercial hub.

“It is, now, no longer a problem confined only to water supply or children’s studies being hampered badly. Non-availability of power supply has forced noise and air pollution generated by gensets to rise in the city,” said Pankaj Ranjan, an LIC agent and a resident of JP Colony.

It has also impacted his business adversely as computers cannot run without battery back-up. Another person, Indu Singh of Malighat, said: “It is difficult to preserve food for long periods, as the fridge is in the absence of electricity.”

Bhagalpur

Alim Ansari, a member of Bihar Bunkar Kalyan Samity, said the power crisis has virtually destroyed the traditional silk industry here. “The silk market had to face losses worth Rs 25 crore on the past three days. On March 26, it had to face the loss of Rs 10 crore. If we have uninterrupted power supply for 4 hours, we could manufacture silk items worth Rs 8 crore and if we have 12 hours power supply, the production would be reached to Rs 24 crore,” he explained.

Power problems have made fast food lovers who often visit fast food joints or to the restaurants disappointed. “I did not have the opportunity to enjoy fast food items since long here as most of the restaurants remained closed here due to power problems,” said Sonali Kumari a college student.

Partho Ghosh, owner of Big Bites and Bake Club, the two reputed fast food centres, also alleged that he had to face loss due to the power crisis.

“We failed to deliver ice cream to our customers, as there was no way of cooling. Besides, many food items damaged due to absence of power,” he said.

Motihari

The ongoing power crisis has adversely affected the lives of common people for the past five days. Examinees cannot prepare well for exams,” said a retired university professor, Ram Pravesh Sharma.

Chhapra

Residents are queuing up at government pumps for water, are being forced to purchase kerosene at an exorbitant rate of Rs 50 per litre and spending a fortune on generator connections apart from being exposed to noise pollution. The students and housewives are worst hit as CBSE, graduate and postgraduate examinations are on. Saran district requires 50MW of electricity but is provided with only 15MW, that too erratic.

Purnea

Buzurg Samaj led by Bhola Nath Alok embraced officials of electricity department and presented marigold garlands to them to present their demand in Gandhigiri style.

Afsar Azmi running a cyber café at Durgabari Chowk said power cuts has hampered his business. Even the inverter or generator were not working properly due to frequent power cuts, inconveniencing customers.