Gladni station repairs not enough, long-term solution needed It appears summers in Jammu are jinxed. If last summer it was the water shortage problem due to break down at Sitlee water filtration plant, this year it is worse with the Gladni Station, which supplies power to three districts of Jammu region, totally burnt down with no other effective alternate means of power supply existing. All that the power minister, in all his wisdom, did was to announce that the problem will persist for another three months. With Jammu reeling under mid-summer crisis, an average of 12 hours of power curtailment is no joke. The casual attitude with which serious problems are treated, especially when the genesis of the problem is the misdoing of the people at the helm of affairs, is rather criminal. The Gladni station breakdown was not entirely unexpected, it didn't happen as an accident, nor is it a case of sabotage. It is a clear cut case of official apathy and criminal negligence of the people in the power department. That the station was in need of repairs was something that the people at the helm of affairs were well aware of. Why then did the bureaucrats and the politicians running the show not focus their attention to this issue of vital importance? Where did the engineers go wrong and why? Obviously, nobody was oblivious of the fact that the Gladni Station, which had not been upgraded for a long time, becomes particularly vulnerable in the summer months when the demand for electricity is much more and so is the load on this transmission power station. Why is it that the power development department officials were sitting back and waiting for a calamity like this to happen? The callousness at various levels here cannot be simply ignored with promise of speedy repairs or just an institutional enquiry. The matter has to be probed and the guilty men brought to book. Besides, repair of the Gladni Station alone will not solve the power crisis that Jammu is reeling under. Serious efforts have to be made for long term solutions. The upgradation of the station has to be properly planned, keeping in view the demand of power. Secondly, an effective alternate power transmission station has to be set up to avoid inconvenience to consumers in case of any major or minor breakdown.