On 20th July 1879, and Englishman, Mr. Flurry, demonstrated and electric bulb to the people of Calcutta. It was a novelty and a sizeable crowd had gathered to witness it. The technology used by Mr. Flurry was simple. A dynamo, driven by a small steam engine, generated electricity and the light it gave dazzled the Calcutta gentry. They wanted this new innovation to replace the oil lamps, which then illuminated the streets of Calcutta. But the expenditure for such a venture was prohibitive.

Electricity was introduced for commercial consumption in Britain on 4th September 1882. Englishmen living in this country and the local aristocracy wanted the same facility and several attempts were made to introduce electricity for public consumption. However, the prohibitive cost of generating electricity using a steam engine driven dynamo delayed this process for some time although it did not deter the rich from illuminating their mansions by hiring a dynamo during festivals and marriages. The same way one can hire a diesel generator today, it was possible in Calcutta of the late 19th century to hire a steam engine driven dynamo.

Dey, Sheel and Co. of 36 Wellington Square started a business of renting out dynamos in 185 and was a pioneer of sorts in this field. They were responsible for providing electrical lights for the dinner hosted on 20th December 1886 in honour of the delegates to the Calcutta Session of the Indian National Congress. One of the guests at the dinner was Rabindranath Tagore. These were essentially temporary arrangements for special occasions, but the King of Bikaner in Rajasthan started using a steam engine driven dynamo for his palace as early as 1886. This was possibly the only instance in those days, where electricity was generated through such an expensive method for day-to-day use.

These efforts occasionally made the headlines in the newspapers. The Statesman of 17th January 1897 carried a news item under the "A brilliant night at the Belvedere". The report said:

…… The handsome reception rooms at Belvedere…were never seen to better advantage than on the occasion of the Ball given by Sir Alexander and Lady Mackenzie on
Thursday night. In the ballroom alone there were ….5 handsome cut-glass electriliers, each of 12 lamps, suspended in the centre of the room, besides 18 wall brackets, each comprising 3 lamps….. In the same way the super-room was fitted with bracket lamps, besides coloured lampshades, which together lit up the apartment very effectively.

Two attempts were made in 1880 (on 31st May and 10th June) to use electric lights at the Howrah Station. A 25-horsepower (hp) steams engine was used to drive four dynamos, which lighted four Carbon Arc Lamps on the two platforms near the Cargo Shed. A similar attempt was made in 1881 in the Alipur Zoo, where on he request of the Zoo authorities, the then Superintendent of the Indian Telegraph Department Mr. Louis Schoendller tried to run an electric train. It was expected to be the main attraction at the zoo but the high costs of operation forced the zoo authorities to discard the idea. Mr. Louis Schoendller was also the man responsible for the two experiments to light up the Howrah Station.

The British never gave up the idea of bringing electricity to every home. Steam engine driven dynamos were expensive and no one was coming forward to set up a thermal power plant on the lines of the City of London. The technology for generating Hydel power was available but there was little scope of setting up such a plant in Calcutta, the country’s capital. Darjeeling, however, was ideally suited for a Hydel power plant. The Tea Estates had brought economic prosperity to the hill station and the Darjeeling Municipality decided to generate its own electricity.

At a meeting of the Municipal Commissioners of Darjeeling on 11th February 1895, president over by the then Deputy Commissioner of Darjeeling and the Chairman of Darjeeling Municipality, Mr. R.T. Greer, ICS it was decided to set up a Hydro Power Station. The Municipality sought for a loan of Rs. 1 lakh from the Government and a site was selected at the foot of the Arya Tea Estate at Sidrabong. The place belonged to the Maharajah of Burdwan, Sir Bejoy Chand Mahatab Bahadur, who give it the Darjeeling Municipality. Though work on the Sidrabong Hydel power started in early 1895, the actual work on the plant was delayed because of lack of technical data about the rivers and streams in and around Darjeeling. Many of the water reservoirs in the used to remain dry through a major part of the year. Sidrabong was on exception as the reservoir there was at the confluence of three small flumes namely, Barbootia, Hospital and Kotwali. Not only the reservoir had water round the year, the water had strong current. Moreover, the proximity of Sidrabong to Darjeeling ensured that there was no need for setting up of long transmission lines. There being no proper road communication all the equipment, machinaries and construction materials had to be transported manually – a Herculean task, quite inconceivable in the present day.

Equipment for the plant’s installed capacity? 130 KiloWatt. Which means, at its full capacity the plant could generate just enough power for one thousand three hundred 100-watt electric lamps. The figure may sound ridiculous to us, used as we are to Mega-Watts or millions and billions of Units. But one should not forget that KiloWatts make Mega-Watts. The first plant consisted of two 65 kW Crompton-Brunton single phase, 2300 volts, 83.8 cycles alternators coupled with two Gunther’s Turbines. A total of one-lakh twenty thousand rupees were spent on setting up the Sidrabong Hydel Power Plant. No estimates of the money spent for construction of the transmission lines and other related expenses are, however, available. But it is worth mentioning here that the first power plant in this country was developed in the public sector under state patronage. Two more units of 135 kilowatts capacity each were added to the power station in 1905 and 1910 and two more of 200 kilowatts each in 1931 and 1935.

Introduction of electricity in Darjeeling town created a sensation all around. Princely States in different parts of the country as well as the Government of India wanted to replicate the example of Sidrabong. In fact, Sidrabong started a race for setting up Hydel power plants among the Princely States. The King of Mysore set up the Shivasamudram Hydel Power Plant in 1902. It used water from the Cauvery River and supplied electricity to Mysore City and the Kolar Gold Mines. A one Mega-Watt Hydel Power Plant was set up at the initiative of Government of India at Aruvan Kadu near the Nilgiris, using water from the Kartery Waterfalls. Another plant of similar capacity came up in a tea estate in Travancore State (now Kerala) in 1906. Two years later, electricity came to Srinagar in the Kashmir Valley from the 4 Mega-Watt Jheelum Hydel Power Project. Other hill stations like Mussorie (1901) and Shimla (1913) followed suit. In 1915, Tata Hydro Electric Agency introduced Hydel power to Bombay. Delhi and Madras, however, were getting electricity from 1908 and 1909 but their source was thermal power. Calcutta had already taken a lead in this field, as electricity was introduced for public consumption in the then Indian capital in 1899 with the installation of a one-megawatt thermal power plant at Imambagh Lane (now Princep Street).