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No respite in sight from power cuts

Kolar struggles as towns and cities are in worse condition than villages
Last Updated 26 September 2012, 17:31 IST

The entire district, including the City, which is the headquarters, has had unlimited power cut the last four days, regardless of whether it is day or night.

Citizens have had barely a few hours of power supply a day and the entire routine has gone haphazard.

Farmers are struggling for the pumps connected to the borewells cannot be used and getting water for the fields is taking great efforts. Worse, there are also complaints that the irregular power supply is also leading to breakdown of machinery.

Bescom and the Karnataka Power Transmission Corporation Limited (KPTCL), which have failed to solve the problem, have only ended up getting the verbal abuses of the citizens, who have not spared Power Minister Shobha Karandlaje too of their curses.

Meet and protest

An officers’ meet is said to have been organised in Bangalore on Wednesday to solve the emergency situation.

The citizens in the district nevertheless staged a protest outside the Bescom circle office in the City on Wednesday. A police complaint was also lodged against four protesters, for damaging office property.

The situation is only expected to worsen in the coming days.

Sources say the total consumption of power in the district is more than 2.2 million units, the maximum power used on a regular basis being about 140 megawatt.

The district requires power between 100 to 110 megawatts at least. The Bangalore LDC (load-shedding centre), however, supplies only 40 megawatt to the district.

Telephone call

The Bangalore LDC officers regularly call the Bescom officers, informing them of the power to be supplied to the district.

An officer at Bescom said that they are expected to maintain a frequency of 49.5 megawatt to 51 megawatt. “Anything lesser will get us to pay a fine,” the officer added.

The district has 66 kv feeders in 10 place and is supplied power from feeders at Nangali, Tayalur, Bangarpet, Tamaka, Mulbagal, Mallasandra, Dhalasanur, Shettymadamangala, Vemagal, Kyalanur, Vakkaleri and Narasapura.

There has been a cut in the supply of power to all of these feeders. The officer said the step has been taken to ensure power supply from Bangalore to the district is proper.

Helpless officer

Ramaswamy, the executive engineer of the Bescom circle office, who spoke to the protesters, too expressed helplessness.

“The senior officers have prohibited us from supplying power for too long to the urban areas, which has aggravated the problems in the towns and the cities,” Ramaswamy said and assured the problem could possibly be solved in a couple of days.

In contrast, however, citizens who contact the Bescom complaint section on telephone number 08152-222017 are told the power cut will continue for another week.

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(Published 26 September 2012, 17:31 IST)

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