GWADAR: The entire Makran region was doing without power on Friday night as supply of electricity from Iran to Gwadar, Turbat and Panjgur districts remained suspended.

The power supply was suspended on Wednesday night and could not be restored till Friday night. As a result, people of the Makran division were forced to make do without electricity in the prevailing hot weather.

Officials of the Quetta Electricity Supply Com­pany (Qesco) said that power supply from Iran was cut due to a technical fault in the transmission line.

“Efforts are being made to remove the fault and restore power supply to the three districts, including port city of Gwadar,” a senior Qesco official said.

“The power supply could remain suspended for another 48 hours due to the fault in the transmission line.” he added.

The officials said that whenever a similar fault occurred in the system, the Iranian authorities cut supply of electricity to Pakistani areas to save their own grid from a power overload.

They added the required equipment and spare parts were not available in Iran and the Iranian authorities had to arrange spare parts from Germany.

Published in Dawn, July 7th, 2018