Strike Leaves Residents Of City ‘power’less | Allahabad News

Prayagraj: Power supply remained disrupted in various localities of the Sangam city on Saturday on the second day of the ongoing 72-hour-long strike by the employees of the electricity department throwing routine life out of gear.
While people faced scarcity of potable water at homes businesses too faced the brunt with long power cuts. Mobile phones and other electronic equipment that have become an essential part of life too were affected due to the disruption.
However, the pleasant weather conditions and sporadic rain in different localities of the city did provide some relief.
Residents of areas like Kareli, Govindpur, Jhalwa, Jhunsi, Church lane, Katra, Talieganj, Kydganj, leader road etc were deprived of electricity and water since Friday night.
The power supply from Karelabagh sub-centre was affected due to a fault at the substation which receives power from the 133 KV line coming from Rewa Road.
Electricity supply was disrupted for long hours (anything from 10-20 hours) in different localities, including posh Civil Lines area where the power was disrupted since 10.00am on Saturday.
Since the area lacks any handpumps, locals were forced to borrow or purchase water from shops and hotels.
Similar conditions prevailed in almost all localities. Angered by the non-availability of electricity and water, locals of Kareli area even staged a protest on Saturday by blocking the road.
Among the rural areas, the four feeders of Naribari, Devra, Kheri, Jarkhori power sub-station at Gaura have been affected since the strike. After shutting down the power supply, people in the area are facing several problems, including that of water, because of which people are pooling money to hire generators to extract drinking water from the bore well. Due to rocky terrain of the area, it is already infested by mosquitoes, which got aggravated due to lack of power supply. Due to the closure of the flour mill, there is a problem of food. The strike has led to increase in demand of inverters and batteries. Those who have the stock of battery have hiked the rates too.
Meanwhile, the district administration has stepped up the efforts to rope in private contractors and discontinued the services of the daily wagers who are participating in the strike. But the efforts are falling short.
Although the district administration has shared a list of mobile numbers of contractors who could be contacted when there is power failure, but they are unable to resolve the issue.
“Now that the people have got our number, they are troubling us by calling again and again, even for the electric faults in their homes. Moreover, as my team is not aware of the power lines and the connections from the substation, we are not able to help much,” said one of such contractors.
District magistrate Sanjay Kumar Khatri inspected several substations on Friday night and Saturday and took stock of the situation.
On Saturday, he held a meeting with the officials of the power department, contractors where it was decided to take support of private sector to rectify the faults of the substation and power lines.
However, no untoward incident was reported from anywhere as the district administration had deployed police personnel at each of the substations and power house.
“Power was down in my locality since morning because of which there was a severe problem of water. Things became more problematic as I have my ailing mother at my home,” said Rashi Kumar, a resident of Civil Lines. However, like Friday, there was no fault in the transmission line of the power department. Power in district is transmitted through a network of transmission line which include 400/132 KVA transmission line coming from Meja, 220 KVA power station at Rewa Road and New Cantt and four sub-stations (each of 132 KVA) at Teliarganj, Minto park, Old power house and Kareli. “The transmission was not affected because of the strike as it was only the distribution part which was affected,” said executive engineer (transmission), LN Chaturvedi.