The killing of a youth by the CISF personnel at Boniyar, Uri, near the Line of Control has taken place at a stage when the state government is under tremendous pressure from the Opposition, separatists and civil society groups to seek return of various power projects from the NHPC, including the one fed by Jhelum at Uri.
They accuse the NHPC of exploiting the huge water resources of the state to its benefit, quoting statistics that show 27 per cent of the corporation’s earnings are from Jammu and Kashmir. The state government has publicly admitted to the fact that the NHPC has failed to return some of the projects as had been agreed upon by the two sides and has served it notices in a few cases of alleged defaulting.
Chief minister Omar Abdullah termed the incident as “tragic beginning of the New Year.” He tweeted, “Tragic beginning to the New Year. Inexcusable use of force in Uri today…swift and exemplary action has followed. Law will now follow course.” In another tweet, he confirmed the arrest of five CISF personnel after the Uri police registered a case against them and assured “no protection under AFSPA will be considered as they were not on counter-insurgency deployment.” Jammu and Kashmir, particularly the Valley, is reeling under frequent and unscheduled load-shedding for the past few weeks sparking off protests by consumers at places. As the temperatures have remained below the freezing point with most parts of the Valley recording a chilling minus of 4-12º C and Leh minus 17.2º C, the erratic power supply with shortage or poor availability of other sources of fuel such as LPG have made living harder. The state power development department (PDD) has justified curtailment which in non-metered areas is as excessive as 12 hours in a day saying the long dry spell has led to aberrant decrease in water release to various hydropower projects resulting into steep fall in electricity generation.
The situation, according to them, has only worsened due to incidence of pilfering.
Reports from Uri said that the frontier township and its neighbourhood have been witnessing erratic power supply for the past one week.