January 03, 2008	Thursday	Zilhaj 23, 1428

TOBA TEK SINGH, Jan 2: The Faisalabad Electric Supply Company (Fesco) has substantially enhanced its loadshedding period, and citizens are suffering a lot from unscheduled power outages for hours and hours every day.

During the past few days, the loadshedding frequency has increased considerably and now citizens are being provided electricity only for a few hours and that too in short spells.

Villages are the worst-hit as they are being provided electricity in 15-minute spells contrary to hours-long outages.

The situation has affected and in some cases halted production work in small industrial units, particularly in textile factories, rendering hundreds of workers and daily wagers jobless during the last two months.

The owners of other small enterprises, including shoe factories and ginning factories, are also facing heavy losses as they have regular employees on their fixed pay-role, and they are still paying them despite there is a meagre production owing to persistent loadshedding.

Local computer colleges and internet cafés are also facing losses due to frequent disconnection of power supply.

Many citizens are facing financial hardship as their home appliances like refrigerators, irons, mobile phones, television sets and computers have been burnt owing to power fluctuations.

Locals are also facing shortage of LPG cylinders while the price of a cylinder has already skyrocketed from Rs650 per cylinder to over Rs900 coupled with their black-marketing.

The use of kerosene has also increased in these days as it is used in lanterns and stoves. There is an acute dearth of this fuel in the city, and this scribe could not find even a litre of kerosene during his visit to several markets.

There is no Pakistan State Oil agency here for the distribution of kerosene, and some vendors purchase the fuel in black-market and then sell it to some selected buyers on inflated rate from Rs60 to Rs65 per litre instead of its original price, which is Rs38 per litre.

Some of the dealers told Dawn that oil-tankers were selling kerosene for Rs42 to Rs45 per litre in Mahmood Kot in Muzaffargarh instead of distributing it to other areas.

BAHAWALPUR: An everyday six-to-eight hour electricity loadshedding has paralysed civic life and business activities in the city and other parts of the district. The Multan Electric Power Company (Mepco) resorted to loadshedding to two to three hours after every one hour in the city on Wednesday affecting the normal civic life.

There had been no power in the city since morning. Due to unscheduled power absence, retailers have increased the prices of candles. When contacted, Mepco officials stated that load shedding was beyond their control as it was being managed by the load management board in Islamabad.