Villages left in dark to feed Uttara EPZ

The power supply situation will worsen in coming days when five more industrial units will go into operation in the EPZ soon, sources said.

The Uttara EPZ at Songolshi village in he Sadar upazila gets power supply from Nilphamari Rural Electrification Board (REB).

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Apart from the EPZ, the REB has about 43,000 consumers in 332 villages in five out of six upazilas in the district. Of them, 447 are small rural industries and the rest are residential consumers.

REB needs 10-12 megawatt (MW) a day but it gets only one to 1.5 to 2 megawatt, while the EPZ alone needs one megawatt, REB sources told this correspondent.

According to government principle, EPZs in the country should get top priority in getting steady power supply. So, REB supplies the lion share of the power it gets from the National Grid to the Uttara EPZ through its B-Feedder to keep it running, doling the rest 0.5-1 mw to the rural areas. At times, when supply from National Grid fluctuates, all the five other feeders for rural areas are switched off for days, the source said.

Mostafizur Rahman, AGM (Communication, Operation and Maintenance) of Nilphamari REB said they do not get any special allotment from the National Grid for the EPZ.

"Now our demand is 10-12 mw per day but the availability is only 1.5-2 megawatt in peak hour", he said.

"We usually supply about one megawatt to the EPZ. The rest can not meet the demand of our numerous consumers. So, we have to go for load shedding in villages for hours", he said.

Housewife Popi Rani of Shutipara village in the Sadar upazila told this correspondent that she has to face 16-18 hours load shedding a day. Sultanuddin, a cloth merchant at Gayabari village in Dimla upazila, said he has become habituated without power. Similar is the situation in about 300 villages in the district. Consumers laid a siege to REB offices in different upazila headquarters in recent months.

EPZ sources said the situation will deteriorate when Caprik Electronics, a Bangladesh-India joint venture to produce electric capacitor and Northern Poly will go into operation within a few months. Construction of three other industrial units--K-P International, Sunflower, Quest Accessories are going on in full swing.

"All the five units are expected to go into operation soon, when demand for power will rise substantially", a source said.

Uttara EPZ Assistant Engineer (electrical) Hafez-Al-Ashad said, "The REB is very sincere to fulfil our demand. We are happy as we do not face any load shedding. But we are worries because we will need 5 mw power when the five new units will go into operation".

AGM Mostafizur Rahman said they have higher authorities' approval for setting up a power sub-station in the EPZ area to meet the growing needs. But here has not been any progress in this regard, he said.