June 27, 2008	Friday	Jamadi-us-Sani 22, 1429

SUKKUR, June 26: Acute power and water crisis continued in Sukkur despite many protests of people as frequency and duration of loadshedding has increased making life more difficult for public.

Power crisis which started three months ago has been translated into an acute water shortage in the city especially for thickly populated New Pind, Shah Khalid colony, Bihar colony, New Goth, Neem Ki Chari, Jillani road, Islam Ganj, Queens road, Ayub Gate, Takkar Muhalla areas.

Residents of these areas fetch water from hand pumps in low lying areas.

Furthermore, traders of the city have also fed up with the frequency and long duration of loadshedding which has damaged their business activities.

It seems that high-ups of Hesco have a turned blind eye to the problem.

Besides the routine daily loadshedding of over 8 to 12 hours, the people of Sukkur and nearby areas have had to brave hours of outages throughout the city, which is carried out by the regional control centre, Hyderabad, by turning off power supply to all grid stations of the city, simultaneously.

Patients in hospitals are the worst sufferers, as they don’t even have potable drinking water in hospitals and have had to purchase bottled water, which is unreasonably expensive for the poor.

The municipal water works officers blamed hours-long loadshedding for the water shortage in the city.