HYDERABAD, April 13: The dismantling of poles of high-tension power lines in Nooriabad on Sunday night has dealt a severe blow to the Nooriabad industrial estate as most of industrial units have been lying closed. Thousands of people, including factory workers and those living in Nooriabad, Than Bula Khan, Thana Ahmad Khan and other areas, are without water supply because of power disruption.

On Sunday night, the Jamshoro grid station noted disruption in power supply near Nooriabad, prompting security guards and Hesco staff to rush to the spot where they found 15 or 16 poles of 132kv lines lying dismantled on the ground.

No one was caught or arrested on the spot.

However, Hesco chief executive Syed Adeebul Hassan Rizvi believed that it was a sabotage act to steal costly wires from poles but arrival of the security guards failed the bid of theft by miscreants. He said nothing had been stolen but the loss to the lines was colossal given the fact that a huge amount was required to ensure provision of power supply after re-erecting the poles.

Out of 52 industrial units, 18 are being run on generators but they are also affected because there is no water supply due to the power breakdown.

Nooriabad Executive Club of Trade and Industry president Kanwar Ziaur Rehman estimated loss of production of the units at Rs40 to 50 million per day.

“Police are well aware of such incidents because they have been informed in the past but unfortunately there is no watch over activities of miscreants”, Mr Rehman observed. “Around eight months ago a similar incident had taken place near the Shahji hotel but it appears that precautionary measures are not being taken by authorities”, he further said.

The poles had been destroyed at two different locations by unknown people, one 10 kilometres away from Nooriabad towards Hyderabad and the second 25 kilometres away from the toll plaza towards Karachi.

Hesco officials began the repair work on Monday to restore power supply.

Underscoring the need for proper security of the power lines, the Hesco chief expressed the hope that power supply would be restored by Thursday.

Talking to Dawn, he sought help of police for security of grid stations and transmission lines.

Sindh government functionaries, including Rangers, are reported to have contacted the Hesco chief on telephone and assured him of help.

“Practically, no help has been provided so far and even an FIR of the incident was registered on Tuesday”, Mr Rizvi said.

He said around Rs10 million loss had been caused due to destruction of the power poles and the Hesco had suffered a loss of around Rs20 million on account of non-consumption of power by industrialists. He added that the damaged wires could not be reused.