| Power cuts, soaring mercury turn Jammu into furnace | | PDD ignores Dy CM's directions | | GS Asgotra
Early Times Report
Jammu, June 19 : Soaring mercury coupled with frequent and prolonged power curtailments have made life of Jammuites hell. There seems no immediate respite for them as Deputy Chief Minister's assurance of uninterrupted power supply during Ramadhan goes in vain.
Curtailments ranging from 12 to 14 hours taxed the patience of the Jammu people Friday as the temperature soared to 40 degrees.
Worst was the condition for the elders and infants, who were unable to bear the heat, when the mercury was touching the highest level of the season.
Officials in Power Development Department (PDD) have been attributing the desilting of a power generation plant in Himachal Pardesh as the main reason for the curtailment of power. "The management of NHPC, which supplies power to Jammu and Kashmir, had taken shutdown for desilting of the pondage for two days, due to which the power supply was affected", an Assistant Executive Engineer (AEE) Rohit of SLTC wing said.
According to reports, power supply remained affected in Sainik colony, Trikuta Nagar, Gandhi Nagar, Shastri Nagar, Sanjay Nagar, Digiana, Satwari, Janipur and many other parts falling under all divisions of PDD in Jammu city.
The power curtailment was observed throughout the day, apart from scheduled curtailments.
With rise in temperature and unscheduled power cuts in city, people have started hitting the streets but the state government has not responded to overcome the seasonal problems which take place every year in summer, Rattan Sharma of Jammu city said.
Ranjeet Singh of Satwari said that it was very difficult to bear the heat and stay indoors, as inverters were also not helping to beat the heat. "Frequent and long unscheduled power curtailments, which have become a permanent feature in city, have made our life worse since mercury is on rise", he said.
It is in place to mention here that the Deputy Chief Minister had promised uninterrupted power supply during Ramadhan and issued directions to the concerned department accordingly. However, it has been reliably learnt that the authorities have ignored his directions.
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