LAHORE, May 29: Almost 70 per cent of Lahore and its suburban areas lost electricity for four hours (between 2pm and 6pm) on Tuesday when a major grid station at Kot Lakhpat got overloaded and had to be switched off for three hours.

According to officials of the Lahore Electric Supply Company (Lesco), 28 of the 40 grid stations in the city went out of operation for four hours. To make the matter worse, the fault was developed at the end of one-hour loadshedding schedule.

“Mercifully, there were no protests or violence in the city,” remarked an official. He said: “The company fears such a reaction whenever power goes missing for more than an hour. The fears are particularly heightened by scorching temperatures with the city sizzling at mid-40s Celsius for the whole of Tuesday. Though it was purely a technical fault, it is hard to justify such prolonged absences of power, especially when the city is already facing 12-hour loadshedding.”

“This is the worst kind of excuse the company can hide behind,” said Malik Asif of Baghbanpura. “There is no electricity for half of the city every alternate hour as the power supply has dipped to half the demand. As the Pepco equipment gets time to cool off, how can a grid station get overloaded in such circumstances,” he said. He criticised the power planners for befooling the masses.

Amjad Afzal of Wapda Town said the power supply was not available during peak ‘heatwave hours’. He said people were becoming nervous wrecks because of shortage of essential utilities. “One cannot sleep, take bath, iron clothes etc. Thousands have lost their jobs due to loadshedding and the situation is disintegrating social fabric of the country,” he said.