KARACHI, June 21: Power breakdowns continued throughout the day in many areas of the metropolis, as temperature came down to 34.5 degrees Centigrade on Monday. Calling from North Nazimabad's Block-A, Sohail Ahmad said that his locality had experienced no fewer than four power breakdowns on Sunday.

"And five power breakdowns occurred on Monday. Actually from morning till 6pm, we have had electricity only for a couple of hours. Every time we call the regional complaint centre, they give a different answer like tripping, loadshedding and wire snapping," he said.

Those who called the Dawn office to lodge their complaints about power breakdowns included residents of Gulistan- i-Jauhar, Gulshan-i-Iqbal, PECHS, Nazimabad, Defence, Federal B Area, Garden West, Malir, Korangi, Garden East, Clifton, Saddar, North Nazimabad and Liaquatabad.

A resident of Adamjee Nagar said that his locality had experienced at least three power breakdowns the previous night. "These days one cannot sleep without an air-conditioner, which we use despite the fact that we have to pay huge electricity bills. Life in apartments becomes hell when we have a power breakdown," he said.

A resident of Defence Housing Authority, Phase V, said that his locality had been facing an acute power crisis. "Power breakdowns have become so frequent and so prolonged that one can actually remember the number of hours one has spent with electricity," he said.

He added that despite repeated attempts he had not been able to find out what caused so frequent power breakdowns in his locality. A resident of Lines Area told Dawn that there were a large number of illegal connections in the narrow bylanes of the locality. But, he added, the KESC officials of his regional power station had done nothing to remove these illegal power connections.

A resident of Model Colony said that his locality faced three-hour electricity breakdown on Monday morning. "We have been experiencing power failures daily for the last couple of weeks and no KESC official is ready to take the responsibility."

Last year, he said, people came on streets in protest against power failures following which the problem was solved with the intervention of city nazim. "People are being provoked to create law and order situation this year too in order to get their due right," he added.

When contacted, a spokesman for the KESC said that no major power breakdown had occurred on Monday and there was no power generation shortage. "The power demand was within 2,000 megawatts and we did not have to carry out loadshedding on a rotational basis. Individual complaints are attended to as and when they are reported to KESC complaint centres," he said.