MARDAN, Dec 20: Over 1,000 people staged a demonstration and blocked the main Mardan-Swabi road for hours in protest against load-shedding of natural gas here on Thursday.

The gas utility observes load-shedding in Mardan for hours due to which the locals face severe problems in cooking and heating water, etc.

A number of delegations and organisations, including those of traders, have been visiting the offices of the utility and informing its senior officials about the problem, but to no avail.

A number of union councils of Mardan have also been unanimously passing resolutions and organising protest demonstrations but no notice has been taken by the officials concerned.

The protesters, led by Abdus Subhan Khan, warned on Thursday that if load-shedding was not done away with immediately, the officials would have to face the people’s wrath. They added that Wapda was also resorting to load-shedding, over which the locals would mount protests after Eid.