Jammu and Kashmir Chief Minister Mehbooba Mufti o launched the central government’s UJALA scheme in the state with the distribution of LED bulbs among people. The National LED programme was launched by Prime Minister Narendra Modi in January 2015. Under this scheme consumer can buy five LED bulbs at the rate of Rs 20 each by showing monthly electricity bills or ID cards.In case of purchase of more than five bulbs, consumers need to pay Rs 95 per bulb.

Highlighting the importance of energy conservation through the spread of LED bulbs, Mufti said it was much more economical to conserve power, than to produce power.

“With each watt saved, we generate one watt of electricity. As one LED bulb consumes one tenth of the energy consumed by a normal yellow bulb, we shall be saving enormous amount of energy if we are able to replace the 80 lakh inefficient bulbs in our state with LED bulbs,” she added.

The Chief Minister said the government was working on a “comprehensive roadmap to augment the generation, transmission and distribution systems” to ensure quality power supply to the consumers, adding it was with this augmented power sector, that the state’s economy could be “revitalised” with because of its cascading effect on all sectors.

The scheme will be implemented in the state by Jammu and Kashmir Power Development Department in collaboration with Energy Efficiency Services Limited (EESL).