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Power cuts cutting deep into daily life

By Atif Khan

ISLAMABAD: Unannounced load shedding is adding to miseries of the residents, already struggling hard to cope with high inflation, and worsening law and order situation in the capital.

“Life has become very tough. High commodity prices, deteriorating law and order situation, and now long spells of unannounced load shedding have robbed us of peace of mind,” Wajahat Mehmood, a resident of F-10, told Daily Times.

He said his children were unable to sleep at night when streetlights also went off.

“Due to unannounced load shedding, routine life is badly disturbed. Whenever you want to press uniforms of the kids or switch on the water pump, the power goes off. The situation is so bad that you cannot complete daily chores,” Amna Haq, a resident of Karachi Company, said.

She said due to abrupt power outages, electronic equipment like bulbs, tube lights and computers also went out of order.

Haq said the entire city drowned into darkness when power was out, giving a dreadful look. The students also complained that they could not study due to unannounced power cuts.

“We need computers to write assignments but computers cannot work without power,” said Shabbir Ahmed, a student of law.

Showing resentment over long spells of load shedding, Farid Ahmed Khan said there was no shortage of power in the country and demanded rulers to re-consider their policies.

According to contracts, independent power producers (IPPs) were paid maximum but they did not produce power at their full capacity. “The government should make IPPs enhance power production to end load shedding,” he said.

Shopkeepers said the use of power generators had become too expensive because of increase in fuel prices.

“It costs up to Rs 300-400 to operate an efficient generator for three hours,” Asif Rana, a shopkeeper at G-10 Markaz, told Daily Times.

The patients at private clinics are also facing problems due to the power cuts. Due to their limited resources, these clinics could not afford generators.

“It is very hard to check a patient or conduct tests on him when the power is out,” Dr Murataza Malik, a doctor at a private clinic, said. Life saving drugs could not be kept cold if power went out for too long, said a druggist.

He said a huge quantity of polio drops and other vaccines were at the risk of expiry due to unavailability of alternative storage system at drug stores in the capital.

The officials of IESCO said they were working to schedule load shedding but feared that unannounced load shedding would go on for some time.

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