Lately, I’ve had to use the phrase “for heaven’s sake” in frustration. The first instance occurred when the media announced that the dreaded load-shedding had increased to 11 hours per day. Dr Prakash Sharan Mahat declared over a BBC (Nepali) interview on Sept 28 (2009) night—Nepalis will suffer no more than 12 hours of daily load-shedding this winter. Earlier, he had stated we wouldn’t face more than 10 hours. On Feb 3, he announced that load-shedding would end by 2015! Another pie in the sky?
Last winter, severe load-shedding affected all of us for the first time. The Maoists ran the government then. They laid the blame on previous administrations, but didn’t mention that the hydro-electric plants they destroyed during their 10-year “people’s war” also added to the problem. No new power project saw completion or initiation during that bloody decade. After the UML-led government took over from May 2009, we expected more from our Energy Minister Dr Mahat but the Nepali, easy-does-it syndrome took over. Mahat had promised new “diesel plants” within the country. Didn’t he go on an overseas junket for them? Now these have disappeared from his vocabulary. His aim to repair the broken generating stations has also escaped his memory. Importing more electricity from India never had bright prospects because our southern neighbor has enough power problems of her own. Even then, final talks on that had to wait till the Indian Foreign Minister SM Krishna visited Nepal. Then we were already enduring 9 hours of daily load-shedding. Now we hear that India will provide only 30 megawatts, and that won’t reduce the daily power cuts.
Mismanagement and the “Nepali time” thrive in our culture. Let’s take the much touted CFL (compact fluorescent light) scheme the government has rather lamely initiated. The best outcome of that has been the TV ad by Madan Krishna Shrestha and Hari Bansha Acharya. The duo proclaimed that CFL bulbs cost more, but give five times greater brightness than the filament variety of the same wattage.
In Kathmandu, some electric hardware shops have begun to “offer” free CFL bulbs. I went to one and asked for my share. He demanded a coupon. Where do I get it? The Nepal Electricity Authority (NEA) meter-checker should have left one at my home. That miracle hasn’t yet happened. How simple it would have been if we could just take our filament-type bulbs and exchange them for the CFL variety!
Having had to cook by candle light during last winter, my family recently installed the 130-watt solar panel set. While that provides light for reading, it can’t run devices like the electric iron, the desktop computer, or the water-pump.
In midst of such government apathy or inefficiency, self-help remains the best option. Sensible citizens had begun to use the CFL lamps well before the government’s “free offer”. Having had to cook by candle light during last winter, my family recently installed the 130-watt solar panel set. While that provides light for reading and proved better than using candles, it can’t run devices like the electric iron, the desktop computer, or the water-pump. Still, “a blind maternal-uncle is better than none”, goes the Nepali proverb. Being able to read, shave, and work by solar-powered lamps has proven to be a bonus but not as satisfactory as having power from the mains.
Experts have indicated that we’ll be saving 320 megawatts by just eliminating electricity leakage. That would be equivalent to building a medium-sized hydro electric power plant. Outside Kathmandu valley (but also in some places within), the government ceases, and people steal electricity blatantly. While spending four days in Lalgadh (in Janakpur Zone) a few months ago, I came across street lights there. Mere dirt tracks big enough for bullock carts qualify as “streets”. Each wire-carrying pole on the road next to a house boasted a big filament-type light bulb (150 to 200 watts). The “streets” didn’t need such high-powered lamps for carts and bicycles that travel at night. Instead, they illuminated the courtyards and animal sheds of homes next to the poles. Besides, all the temples in Lalgadh (as elsewhere throughout Nepal) receive free electricity which emits light uselessly throughout the night. People cook on electrical stoves by “hooking up” two wires directly unto the transmission lines. Who suffer? The people of Lalgadh. The fans stop functioning after midnight, and the sweltering heat disturbs sleep.
Dr Mahat, please do some advance planning for next winter. Should the constitution come out on May 28 and elections take place, your tenure as the energy minister may expire. However, the bloke who follows you will have to carry out your good projects to completion. If you can just get the NEA technicians to crack down on the 320-megawatt leakage, load-shedding will disappear next year. Or, will the government and NEA only tackle new projects that provide commission?
I had to utter the phrase “for heaven’s sake” again when the Maoists threatened the Indian GMR-ITD Consortium which is developing the 300-megawatt Upper Karnali Hydroelectric Project. The Maoists are rooting for “national independence” when in reality we can survive only through “international interdependence”. Asking the GMR-ITD Consortium to leave the country will hardly guarantee our sovereignty. If the Maoists believe that Nepal has behaved as a semi-colony of India since the 1816 Sugauli Treaty, tough luck! We can’t choose our neighbors; we have to learn to survive with them. Our location between gigantic China and India doesn’t give us more choice than to live under their influence. Despite some minor problems, we should regard having democratic India as our southern neighbor a great blessing.
The 300-megawatt Upper Karnali Hydroelectric Project would eliminate the present load-shedding. It would ensure that at least our children will have uninterrupted power supply prior to their SLC exams. No sane person can fathom why the Maoists have to oppose such a project. Does Chairman Pushpa Kamal Dahal need the “national independence” issue just to keep his Young Communist League busy? Before that he tried “civilian supremacy”, Maoist-engineered federal states, and parallel governments. Many protest-fatigued Nepalis would readily prefer Indian colonization to Maoist-type of independence if that means more dark nights (due to the closure of the Upper Karnali project), continuous bandas, and hot-air harangues. On Feb 3, the United Maoists announced their fifth phase of protests when they should have been facilitating constitution-writing and cooperation with other parties. For heaven’s sake, Dahalji, permit our country the Upper Karnali Hydroelectric Project; allow us 24 hours of electricity per day in the future.
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