Massive load shedding results in water shortage

* Different timings of power outages for homes and tube wells blamed for water scarcity

By Shabbir Sarwar

LAHORE: Up to 14 hours of load shedding has resulted in shortage of drinking water for the residents of Fleming Road, Qila Gujjar Singh, Madina Colony and many other areas of the city.
Residents of these areas told Daily Times that due to different schedules of electricity load shedding for domestic consumers and tube wells, people remain unable to fill their water tanks.
Imran Chaudhry, a resident of Fleming Road, said that the government made tall claims of providing generators and diesel to tube wells to ensure 24-hour water supply to the citizens “but in fact water availability has become a big problem in our area”.
“Most of the residents of the area rely on electric water pumps to fill their water tanks and are dependant on electricity to meet household water requirements. When the power supply is restored in our home, there is normally no electricity to run tube well in the area,” he said.
Another resident of the area demanded that the city district government take immediate action in order to ensure uninterrupted water supply for citizens.
Residents of Madina Colony also complained about different load shedding timings for homes and tube well of the area.
Load shedding has been increased in the city due to ongoing energy crisis in the country. Less oil supply to power generators and increase in domestic consumption of gas due to cold weather are being blamed for reduction of power generation through the national grid.
LESCO Director (Operations) Farasat Zaman said that if a tube well is powered by one feeder and domestic connection of a community by another “then obviously there is a difference in load management time and people of the area will have to face problem in getting water through electric water pumps”.
“Water consumers have also illegally installed electric water pumps to pump water from WASA water lines,” he said.
He said LESCO was carrying out up to 12 hours of load shedding for tube wells, six hours for residents of urban areas and 10 hours for rural areas.
When told that up to 14 hours of load shedding has been reported in urban areas of LESCO jurisdiction, he insisted there was no load shedding of more than 6 hours in the city.
“We also shift load shedding schedule in order to ensure supply of electricity to consumers and adjacent tube wells at the same time so that they can fill their water tanks,” he said.

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