'Ensure uniform power for rural, urban areas'

In response to a complaint lodged by the National Farmers Association for Rights and Awareness(NAFARA) of Mysore, the SHRC has said that the Government was doing injustice to the rural population by providing less hours of power supply to the villages than their urban counterparts. A report from the Managing Director of Karnataka Power Transmission Corporation Limited(KPTCL) says that the rural regions were provided with six hours of double-phase and six hours of single-phase power.

The report also suggests that all urban centres, except for Bangalore were given electricity for a minimum 21 hours and a maximum upto 24 hours, it said.

N K Channaraj, president of NAFARA told reporters on Monday the SHRC had asked the KPTCL, the power ministry and the State government to end the disparity. Nearly 70 per cent of the population resided in villages and the rural population was primarily responsible for feeding the people of state and country. It was no fair that the villagers were treated as secondary citizen’s, he said.

The forum said they would wait to see the action taken by Government over the SHRC’s observation. They would chalk out our next move and strategy if the State to failed to address the issue.

NAFARA is an organisation working for the cause of farmers and agriculture sector. Secretary of the forum Harish, member Vishakante Gowda and others were present.