KOHAT, May 25: The electricity consumers in the city are facing long outages and persistent low voltage problem due to delay in completion of the Kohat Development Authority (KDA) township grid station project, which was approved in 2004 to divide the load among three parts of the city.

When contacted, officials of Peshawar Electric Supply Company (Pesco) told this correspondent that the city–III part had been the worst affected by loadshedding because of sharing the additional burden of KDA town and some other areas.

They said that there was only one grid station built in 1973 for the city whereas the load had tripled since then. Many new towns had emerged in the city's surroundings, but no new grid was built for the burgeoning population.

During investigations, it was revealed that of the two grid stations approved for Kohat one had been built in Bannu on the orders of former chief minister Mohammad Akram Durrani of the JUI-F and another at Daudkhel in Punjab.

Keeping in view the demand of people, the government had approved a grid station for the KDA township in 2004, which was expected to be completed in 2006.

The KDA had allotted 50 kanals to the Water and Power Development Authority (Wapda) for the new 132-KV grid station, which raised the hopes for the solution to the long-standing problem of low voltage in KDA township, Kohat city comprising six sub-divisions, Darra Adamkhel and Hangu.

But work on the project had not been completed as yet while former state minister for water and power Amir Muqam had repeatedly said that funds were approved for the project.

When contacted, technical staff of Pesco said that normally a grid station was energized within six months, but the KDA project had been lying pending for the last seven years.

The consumers are suffering power outages in addition to the routine loadshedding of over 10 hours, as parliamentarians in connivance with the officials have been doing politics over the provision of electricity and transformers to different areas. The officials said that power breakdowns were being caused because the present system could not bear load and dozens of transformers were needed in the city and rural areas to overcome the problem.

Consumers are being told to contact their elected representatives for provision of more transformers to ensure smooth power supply.

According to an official at the city complaint office, Kohat city had been divided into three parts and the extra load had been shared by the city-III part, which was the main reason for frequent power disruptions in the area.

He said that each of the two phases of the city near Bannu gate and government public school tripped more than five times a day and the removal of fault during odd hours took two to three hours.

A few months ago, MNA Pir Dilawar Shah inaugurated a 200-KV transformer in Bazaar-i-Mustafa on people's demand. However, after a fortnight the Pesco officials removed the transformer and when people complained to the MNA he reportedly also ordered the removal of the inauguration plaque from the site.

Similarly, consumers have been asked to collect money for buying and installation of heavy transformer in the Hindu mohallah chowk after the parliamentarians refused to approve it for them.