KARACHI, May 16: Major stakeholders have strongly opposed the KESC demand for monthly and quarterly increase in tariff on account of variations in cost of fuel and power purchased from the National Transmission & Despatch Company (NTDC).

Representatives of the Karachi Chamber of Commerce and Industry, SITE Association, Karachi Nuclear Power Plant, Pakistan Institute of Engineering and others raised objections when two petitions of the Karachi Electric Supply Company seeking a tariff hike came up for hearing by the National Electric Power Regulatory Authority on Monday.

They demanded that the regulatory body should ensure that inefficiencies on account of uneconomic use of fuel and power plants by the KESC are not passed on to consumers through upward revisions of tariff.

In one of the pleas, the KESC stated that the invoice for March was received from the NTDC on April 19 according to which the fuel cost of power purchased from the NTDC (previously calculated on a provisional basis at Rs3.076 billion) increased to Rs3.47 billion.

As such the variations in fuel price and power purchase were 54.424 paisa and 104.512 paisa, respectively, bringing the total difference in cost to 154.937 paisa per kWh, the KESC claimed.

In the other petition, the KESC sought quarterly upward revision of 224.180 paisa per kWh on account of fuel and power purchase cost variation for the month of March 2011 and un-recovered cost for January-March 2011 and October-December 2010 periods.

Criticising the power utility for unannounced loadshedding and unattended faults, former legislator Laiq Ahmad Khan said that the KESC by reduced generation on one pretext or the other had plunged the country's economic hub into darkness. He criticised its management over its move to sack around 4,000 employees, fomenting violence in the city.

He opposed the KESC demand

KARACHI, May 16: A crowd of marchers on M.T. Khan Road protesting against prolonged power outages was tear-gassed when they refused to return after an hours-long standoff that caused a severe traffic gridlock on Monday evening.

Police also fired in the air to disperse the protesters, who had blocked the main road with burning tyres causing traffic jams on Club Road, Dr Ziauddin Ahmed Road and I.I. Chundrigah Road.

The people had taken to the streets against massive electricity breakdowns when the power utility failed to restore the supply.

While there was no official word about any casualty in the action, sources at the Jinnah Postgraduate Medical Centre said at least three people, one of them with a bullet wound in the left leg, were brought injured to the health facility.

A large number of protesters emerged at Mereweather Tower shortly after police, traffic police and Rangers officials had succeeded to revive the traffic on M.T. Khan Road. “They set a traffic police kiosk on fire and hurled stones at moving vehicles. The police force has been enhanced to control the situation,” said a Kharadar police station official.

Protest demonstrations against power failures were also staged in Garden, Soldier Bazaar, North Nazimabad and North Karachi. Residents said the power supply remained suspended in some areas for more than 36 hours and in others for last three days.

A protest march from Regal Chowk to Karachi Press Club was also staged by the KESC workers solidarity committee against loadshedding and retrenchment. The marchers demanded cancellation of KESC's privatisation deal, the reinstatement of employees and end to outages.

The power utility management meanwhile lodged an FIR at the Artillery Maidan police station against eight union activists who the former alleged had asked employees to vacate the Saddar office through “intimidation and life threats”.—Staff Reporter