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| Power thefts on rise in Kashmir, as PDD-police prefer blame-game | | Consumers seek LG’s intervention | | Early Times Report
Srinagar, Nov 21: The Jammu and Kashmir government is suffering huge losses due to theft of power in Kashmir while the Power Development Department and the Jammu and Kashmir Police are allegedly resorting to blame game.
Official sources said despite numerous complaints of power theft coming in from various areas, especially the summer capital of Srinagar, the PDD has been unable to check the menace.
The PDD officials have been pleading the failure saying that the they have requested police to provide escort while the cops say they are always ready for the duty whenever asked by the government to do so.
Sources said while the hooking of power in residential areas was on rise especially in the evening hours, a major nexus between the PDD staff and commercial consumers was not being ruled out.
Sources said across the summer capital Srinagar major number of commercial establishments like coaching centers, hostels, guesthouses and small scale units were being run on domestic connections.
Official sources said such consumers were supposed to run on separate privately installed transformers but that they were running on the colony transformers.
“This is not only injustice with the locals that their share of power is grabbed by commercial units but that such system was putting the government to undue loss,” said a senior official in the PDD on the condition of anonymity.
Sources said such power pilferage was a main cause of unscheduled cuts. “There is an overload from such commercial connections but the concerned are not working properly,” the sources said.
Sources said some senior PDD officials were unwilling to launch major inspections in some “influential areas of Srinagar” and that blaming police was nothing but a “lame excuse.”
“The cooking heaters are often seized from the houses of the poor people but the rich who are resorting to loot are not being touched,” the official sources in the PDD said.
Sources said though the District Commissioner Srinagar has recently decided to regulate rentals of hostels in Srinagar, the official has been “kept in dark” that such houses were consuming power from residential connections, said a PDD official adding that the DC should seek an explanation in this regard from power officials.
When contacted senior official in the PDD tried to downplay the matter saying that the department has started conducting inspections. “Actually inspections were stopped during the lockdown but now the process has been resumed and we look ahead for support from police,” he added.
The official however had no replies on as to why many hostels and guesthouses in Srinagar were running on colony transformers.
Meanwhile the concerned consumers of PDD have appealed the Lieutenant Governor Manoj Sinha to personally look into the matter. |
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