KARACHI, Sept 12: The Karachi Electricity Supply Corporation on Tuesday resorted to loadshedding across the city following shutdown of two its power generating units at Bin Qasim Power Station.
The KESC said it resorted to load-shedding on rotational basis to meet shortfall in power demand as two of its units of 210 MW each are out of bar for repair and maintenance.
The power utility shed around 40 MW load during the day peak hours and 137 MW in evening peak hours.
KESC’s engineers are busy working and the affected units would resume power on Wednesday, officials in the power utility said.
Although the residents of the city suffered intermittent power disruptions as KESC was short of generation, the Federal B Area was the most affected, where residents faced prolonged power outages.
A resident of Block-15 said the power supply was disrupted at noon and it was restored at 6pm. The supply was again disrupted at 7pm and it was not restored for two hours.
Another resident of Block-20 said the power supply played hide-and-seek in his locality all the day and the previous night.
A consumer from Block-17, Federal B Area, said voltages remained low, posing a constant threat to electrical appliances.
He said low voltage and intermittent power failures spanning 90 to 120 minutes had made the life of residents miserable as they could not take good sleep all the night due to intermittent power failures.
Besides, a resident of Gulistan-i-Jauhar in Block-16/A said the power supply remained suspended for two hours in his locality.
A consumer from Jamshed Quarters said the disruption in power supply had become order of the day in her locality.
She said that power supply played hide-and-seek all the day and many attempts to lodge complaints at the centralized complaint number of the KESC bore no fruits.
Meanwhile, All-Pakistan Organization of Small Traders and Cottage Industries Karachi has demanded of the KESC to restore electricity to busy markets of old city within 24 hours and warned that they would stage a sit-in on MA Jinnah Road outside Memon Masjid if power supply was not restored, adds PPI.
Mehmood Hamid, Abdul Majid, Sharif Tahir Memon and Akhtar Hussain, in their joint statement, condemned load-shedding, and said Marriott Road, Khori Garden, Boultan Market and other markets of old city areas had been without electricity for the last two days.
They termed it a failure of the KESC. They said due to power suspension, traders of small markets had been facing hardships.
They warned the KESC administration to restore power supply to these localities, otherwise they would stage a sit-in.