PESHAWAR: A fire caused by electricity overload damaged the control room of Sheikh Mohammadi grid station on the outskirts of provincial capital on Sunday, the Peshawar Electric Supply Company (PESCO) and rescue officials said.

However, no casualty was reported.

They said that the fire started at around noon and it was brought under control after over two hours by the Rescue 1122 firefighters. About 10 firefighters and three engines took part in the effort.

A Pesco statement said that the fire at the 500KV Sheikh Mohammadi grid station was caused by overload and it gutted six breakers of 11KV. It said that though the fire had been controlled, power supply to areas linked to the affected 11KV feeders was still suspended.

The statement said that the damaged feeders include Mashogagr, New Badbher, AWT, Sarband-I, Sarband-II and Balarzai.

ARREARS COLLECTION: The PESCO has claimed improvement in collection of electricity arrears from both the federal and provincial governments.

Figures shared with Dawn show that the company has made recoveries of about Rs1.8 billion from both the federal and provincial governments as of June 30, 2015.

The arrears due to be paid by the federal government, including for Azad Jammu and Kashmir, federal departments, and local and autonomous bodies under the centre, amounted to over Rs12 billion on June 1, while collection by Pesco for the month stood at Rs606.4 million.

The outstanding arrears of the federal departments on June 1 stood at Rs331.97 million, while billing for the month added another Rs266 million to the total. Of this amount about Rs484 million had been paid to the company.

The figures for the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa government also showed improvement. The provincial government departments’ arrears stood at Rs220.9 million on June 1, which had now been brought down to Rs111.8 million after payments to the company.

PESCO spokesperson Shaukat Afzal said that the company had made good progress in recovery of arrears compared to the previous years.

Published in Dawn, August 3rd, 2015

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