HYDERABAD: The Jamaat-i-Islami (JI) has formed various committees to look into the issues of unannounced load-shedding and alleged demand of bribe by the staff of Hyderabad Electric Supply Company (Hesco) from consumers for repair of the faulty transformers.

A JI press release issued on Sunday said that those legal, technical and monitoring committees would submit their reports soon and then future strategy would be announced at a briefing.

The teams were formed at a meeting chaired by Hafiz Tahir Majeed. It discuss Hesco-related problems in detail, including posting of “corrupt and incompetent” officials at the subdivisional level.

Besides the issues of faulty transformers, alleged demand of bribe by Hesco staff and unannounced load-shedding, it also discussed problems of sewerage and drainage of rainwater which become complicated with power outages.

Mr Majeed alleged that Hesco was patronised by the federal and provincial governments. He vowed that the JI would not remain silent over the excesses and would hold protests to highlight issues reflecting public sentiments. There was great provocation among people and Hesco was forcing consumers to come on streets, he said.

Despite the lockdown, he said, six-to-eight hour power outages continued in the city and the episode was attributed to repair of transformers, falling of wires or towers and faulty transformers.

Published in Dawn, July 13th, 2020