Prime minister of Bangladesh Sheikh Hasina on Thursday called upon market owners and shopkeepers not to use electricity from the national power grid after 7:00pm in order to help the government to tackle the present power crisis.
   While presiding over a special meeting at the Power Division, she also directed the power distribution agencies to shorten the period of outage to one hour from two, and shed load every alternate hour.
   ‘The prime minister has called upon the market owners and shopkeepers not to use electricity from the national power grid after 7:00pm. If any one wants to keep their shops and businesses open after that time, they have been asked to depend on their own generators,’ power secretary Md Abul Kalam Azad told reporters after the two-hour meeting.
   He said that the existing ban on the daily business of shops and markets after 8:00pm would continue.
   When he was asked how they would make sure the markets and shops were abiding by the PM’s call, he just said that he hoped that everyone concerned would respond positively.
   He said her directive to reduce the time of outages and shed load every alternate hour would be made effective from today.
   ‘In recent days, we used to enforce two-hour outage after every two-hour period. In total a city area faces around 8-12 hours of load-shedding. From now on we will enforce one hour of load-shedding every alternate hour. However, the period of load-shedding will remain at 8-12 hours a day,’ explained an official of the Dhaka Power Distribution Company.
   The prime minister also asked the officials to find out ways for easing the lengthy process of tender and purchase to commission new power projects in the shortest possible time.
   Hasina, also responsible for the power, energy and mineral resources ministry, asked the senior officials present at the meeting to come up with innovative plans to resolve the two crises of power and energy, which are seriously affecting the people’s life at present.
   She directed the power officials to motivate the consumers not to waste electricity.
   The power secretary said that the power generation gap was created over five to seven years ago and it could not be reduced overnight.
   Thursday’s meeting was the third one at the power ministry after Sheikh Hasina took over in January, 2009.
   Hasina held the meeting amid the worst power crisis in the country which has made the life of the poor people miserable and affected the life of even those who are well-off.
   The meeting took place at a time when the PM’s power and energy adviser Tawfiq-e-Elahi Chowdhury and state minister Muhammad Enamul Huq were on an overseas trip.
   City residents are facing severe problems in the sweltering heat because of the 8-12 hours of load-shedding, while people in other parts of the country are undergoing 16 hours of load-shedding.
   The power officials told the PM that increase in power generation was difficult because of the acute shortage of gas. They also unfolded before the PM their plans to increase power generation on emergency, short-term, medium-term and long-term bases.
   The PDB currently generates only 3,900MW electricity against the demand for around 5,500-6,000MW.
   Energy secretary Meshbahauddin Ahmed told reporters that the PM had directed them to increase gas production by drilling more wells in the productive gas-fields.
   She also directed the energy officials to increase the use of Liquefied Petroleum Gas by reducing its price and take immediate steps for importing Liquefied Natural Gas.

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