KARACHI, March 21: The ill-maintained transmission and distribution network of the Karachi Electric Supply Corporation broke down in many localities of the city as the ongoing heat wave intensified on Monday.
According to the Met Office, the maximum and minimum temperatures on Monday were 33 degrees centigrade and 22 degrees centigrade. Humidity dropped to 37 per cent.
Sources in the centralized complaint centre of the power utility told Dawn that the localities which experienced prolonged and multiple power cuts on Monday included Federal B Area, North Nazimabad, Lyari, Sharafabad, Clifton, Dhoraji, Gulshan-i-Iqbal, New Karachi, Defence Housing Authority, Gulistan-i-Jauhar and Korangi.
They said while it was normal for complaints of power breakdowns to go up in summer, this year the number of such shutdowns was higher than it was the previous year. They conceded that because of uncertainty in the KESC following its privatization, employees were probably not working as efficiently as before. But many KESC consumers calling from different localities of the city argued that KESC employees had never been efficient.
A resident of Defence, Phase V, said: “I called 118 to inform them about the power breakdown in our locality. The telephone operator who attended my call said he had no idea why the breakdown had occurred. He told me that mine was the first complaint from the area. But he was unable to tell me how long we would have to do without electricity,” he said, adding that his power supply was restored after over four hours.
A resident of Federal B Area, Block 18, told Dawn that his locality had been without electricity since morning. “We have called the complaint centre many times, but the KESC staff have not been able to tell us exactly why the power breakdown occurred in the morning. First they said it was a tripping incident. They subsequently changed their views and said that there was a cable fault in the locality. A few minutes back a KESC official told me that it was actually an EHT fault. They have taken more than seven hours to figure out what the nature of the fault is. I wonder how long they will take to rectify the fault,” he said.
A resident of Gulshan-i-Iqbal, Block 10, told Dawn his locality had multiple power breakdowns the previous night from 8pm to 3am.
Another resident of the same locality said the KESC complaint centre had not responded to his complaints. “Every time I called them, they said a van had been dispatched to the locality which would rectify the fault. It beats me why the van never reached the locality and fixed the fault,” he said.
WATER SHORTAGE: The city got 11.5 million-gallon less water on Monday due to the suspension of power supply by the KESC to the Karachi Water and Sewerage Board pumping installations from 1pm to 2pm, adds PPI.
A KWSB press release day said the effects of the water shortage would be felt on Tuesday as well. It further said the KESC had not informed the KWSB beforehand about the suspension of power supply.