High-loss areas to face loadshedding during holidays
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ISLAMABAD: The Ministry of Water and Power announced on Thursday that there would be no loadshedding for domestic and commercial consumers during three Eid days. But the people living in areas with more line losses and less recovery will continue to face routine loadshedding on those days.
A spokesman for the ministry said in a statement that directives had been issued to all power distribution companies (Discos) to make special arrangements to ensure that there was no loadshedding across the country from 6pm on Thursday till Sunday night. But he said the areas where the losses were high due to various reasons would not get this exemption.
The spokesman said Discos had constituted special teams to implement the decision. Similarly, special cells have been set up under the chief executives of respective Discos to address complaints received from consumers.
In order to contain losses of billions of rupees suffered by the national exchequer because of power pilferage, the government had last year announced a policy under which the people living in high-loss areas would face extended loadshedding of 16 to 20 hours as a punitive measure.
During protests against loadshedding, Water and Power Minister Khawaja Asif and his deputy Chaudhry Abid Sher Ali had on numerous occasions said on the floor of parliament that cities and towns where people stole electricity or did not pay bills would have to face outages and that the government would show no leniency.
The government maintains that power theft poses a serious threat to the country’s distribution system.
Since Punjab has the best recovery ratio among the provinces as far as electricity dues are concerned, the cities and towns in the three smaller provinces have suffered the most because of this government policy, which is often criticised in parliament, particularly by legislators belonging to nationalist parties.
The ongoing energy crisis has become a bone of contention between the ruling PML-N and other parties, particularly those ruling in other provinces. The issue has been under discussion in different committees of the two houses of parliament and even at the forum of the Council of Common Interests for several months.
Rejecting criticism by the legislators and representatives of the three smaller provinces, Minister of State for Water and Power Abid Sher Ali had reportedly said that he was not against Pakhtuns, Sindhis or any other community, but against those who were involved in power theft.
He claimed that almost all people living in high-loss areas were involved in power theft either by directly stealing electricity through hooks or by supplying electricity illegally to others.
Published in Dawn, September 25th, 2015
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