Sikkim, Gujarat, Tripura, Maharashtra and Telangana are the top five states reporting minimum hours of power cuts in the country.
There has been considerable improvement in the situation of power cuts in urban areas all over the country. As per information provided by the Urban Jyoti Abhiyan (URJA), under the Ministry of Power, the average duration of power cuts in urban areas stood at 8.29 hours in August this year, compared to 13.37 hours of power cuts in August 2016, thus an overall reduction of power cuts to about 40%.
Accordingly, the situation in Uttar Pradesh and Bihar has improved in a major way as the power cut period has come down drastically by more than 90%.
The two states recorded average power cuts of 6.13 hours and 4.06 hours respectively in August. Significantly, this duration was 91.04 hours and 71.11 hours in August 2016, respectively.
As per the figures, Sikkim was ranked the number one state with the minimum hours of power cuts (0.31 hours), followed by Gujarat (1.49 hours), Tripura (3.03 hours), Maharashtra (3.12 hours) and Telangana (3.40 hours).
However, the situation in Haryana was quite bad as the average hours of power cuts in August was as high as 37.46 hours, though it has posted a marked improvement from 109.26 hours two years ago.
The situation, on the other hand, worsened in Uttarakhand and West Bengal, where there were power cuts of 26.56 hours and 10.6 hours in August this year, respectively, compared to 4.49 hours and 10.56 hours of power cuts, in that order, two years ago.
Among the poll-bound states, Madhya Pradesh recorded 4.52 hours of power cuts in August, compared to 10.30 hours two years ago, and Chhattisgarh 18.39 hours of power cuts. Surprisingly, Chhattisgarh is said to be a power-surplus state. Figures were, however, not available for Rajasthan and Mizoram.
On the basis of redced number of power cuts, Maharashtra came on first position, followed by Himachal Pradesh, Gujarat, Uttar Pradesh and Kerala, for the month of August.
Sources said improvement in power cuts was due to improved power generation. According to Central Electricity Authority (CEA), India generated 102 billion units (BU) of power in July this year, compared to 98 BU in the same month last year.
This figure includes power generated from conventional sources like thermal, hydro and nuclear sources as well as import from Bhutan.
The Power Ministry, headed by Piyush Goyal, had last year launched the Urja Mitra mobile app which provides real time information sharing on power supply.
Power consumers across the country can have prior intimation of expected duration and cause of scheduled power outages and post fault intimation of unscheduled power outages duration. They can also lodge a complaint on power cuts in their areas.