QUETTA June 20: The chairman Wapda, Lt-Gen Zulfiqar Ali Khan, has announced that the power connection of tubewells of those Zamindars (landlords) will be cut off from Saturday, who have failed to pay the first instalment of the dues pending against them.

Speaking at a news conference here on Friday evening he said that the action against landlords was decided in a meeting with the chief minister, Jam Mir Mohammad Yousaf, and representatives of Zamindars Action Committee held here earlier in the day.

He said that in the last meeting the growers were given a deadline for the payment of their outstanding dues till June 20, but they deposited Rs37 million instead of Rs77 million as first instalment of the outstanding dues pending against them.

“The power connection of all defaulters would be cut off ,” the chairman announced and said that the outstanding amount reached up to Rs547m against the growers of Balochistan.

He said that Wapda was making all possible efforts to provide power to the maximum areas of the province and in this connection it will spend Rs5 billion on various projects in Balochistan during the coming fiscal year.

He said that the proposal for implementing these projects has been sent to the federal government for approval.

He said that these projects included establishment of Gadakha transmission line (TL) and grid station, 220 KV Dadu-Khuzdar TL, 132 KV Khuzdar-Naal TL, Naal grid station, Loralai-Dukki TL and augmentation of Pishin, Kalat, Gulistan, Qilla Saifullah and Khuzdar grid stations.

Replying to a question about power supply to Mekran region from Iran, the Wapda chairman said that all necessary arrangements have been finalized in this regard and hoped that the power supply would start in these areas by September this year.

Referring to six-hour daily loadshedding in Quetta, Zulfiqar Ali Khan disclosed that 22 towers collapsed in Bakhtiar Abad near Dera Murad Jamali on May 26 and unknown people have stolen 14-kilometer long electricity wires.

However, he said that the work on restoration of proper power supply to Quetta and repair of damaged TL were in progress and it would complete by Sunday next.

He said that the provincial governor and the chief minister had decided to deploy levies personnel along the TL in the area as a precautionary measure to check such incidents in future.

PROJECTS DROPPED: The opposition leader in the Balochistan Assembly, Kachkol Ali Baloch, has accused the planning and development minister of dropping 200 ongoing uplift projects and said that it would waste the funds spent on them.